


Boys

by epeolatry



Series: Just Like Always [1]
Category: Captain America - All Media Types, Marvel Cinematic Universe
Genre: Anal Fingering, Anal Sex, Awkward Sexual Situations, Bad BDSM Etiquette, Barebacking, Bathing/Washing, Blow Jobs, Bottom Bucky Barnes, Bucky's last night, Chronic Illness, Coming In Pants, Coming Untouched, Day At The Beach, Dirty Talk, Dom/sub Undertones, Drunkenness, First Kiss, First Meetings, First Time, Frottage, Homophobic Language, I'll tag it just in case, Internalized Homophobia, Kinda?, Light Bondage, M/M, Masturbation, Military Homophobia, Minor Character Death, Minor Injuries, Minor Violence, No Safeword, Non-Consensual Bondage, Non-Sexual Bondage, Panic Attacks, Period-Typical Homophobia, Period-Typical Racism, Prostate Massage, Riding, Rimming, Sexuality Crisis, Sharing a Bed, Steve's unsuccessful enlistment attempt #4, Subspace, Tattoos, Top Steve Rogers, Topping from the Bottom, Vomiting, Wet Dream, World War II, naive boys discovering prostates for the first time, semi sub drop?
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2014-08-18
Updated: 2014-10-20
Packaged: 2018-02-13 17:53:49
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 11
Words: 23,321
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/2159736
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/epeolatry/pseuds/epeolatry
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Two scrappy boys meet in Brooklyn during the Depression. For the longest time they'll think that being dirt poor is the worst the world can throw at them, but from the very start they know that each is the best of the other's life.</p><p>Or; Steve and Bucky's origin years, complete with clumsy feelings and illegal boners.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

At fifteen years old Steve Rogers was five foot two and barely scraped eighty-five pounds wet. His skinny body had so far fought off two bouts of pneumonia, four serious asthma attacks, scarlet fever, undiagnosed arrythmia, and a predisposition to stress-induced migranes. At fifteen Steve Rogers was lucky to be alive. It was a fact that did not occur to him as he felt a rib crack under the onslaught of the larger boy's boot repeatedly kicking into his curled-up body.

 

Steve was no stranger to taking beatings - skinny, sickly, artistic kids with big mouths and bigger ideals rarely were - but in his wide experience the sustained ferocity of this particular attack was unusual. He could taste blood but he wasn't sure if it was coming from his nose or his mouth, and every time he tried to move another blow immobilised him further.

 

"Jeez kid, you gotta learn to stay down!" laughed a malicious voice somewhere above him. Steve would have looked up, but his left eye was already swelling shut and his head was pounding too much to move.

 

"The hell you doin' down there Wheeler?" came a new voice, further away and curious. Steve wheezed in an opportunistic breath as the kicking stalled.

 

"Teaching this punk kid to keep his nose outta other people's business."

 

Steve managed to crack open his right eyelid and through hazy vision discerned the stocky figure of another boy entering the alleyway. The boy spoke again and his tone was cocksure and jovial, his voice already beginning to carry the deeper timbre of a man, unlike Steve's own embarrassing squeak.

 

"Ain't his nose I'm worried about," said the newcomer conversationally, "You keep kicking him like that you're gonna break a rib."

 

"And what if I do? What's he gonna do about it?" sneered the first boy, and Steve could imagine the pugnacious jut of the jaw even though he couldn't see it.

 

"Skinny little kid like that? Nuthin'. He'll probably run home to his mama and she'll patch him up best she can and maybe he won't go sniffing after trouble with no account jerks like you no more. But  _me_ ," even through the rushing in his ears Steve could hear the sudden note of steel in the boy's formerly warm voice, " _I_  could make trouble for you. See I don't like bullies, especially not the kind who get off on giving a kicking to a kid half their size. So beat it Wheeler, ‘less you want _me_ to teach _you_ a goddamn lesson."

 

There was a tense pause during which Steve heard nothing but the pulsating roar of blood in his own head and saw nothing but the blurred outlines of two boys staring each other down over the top of him, like he was some scrap of meat between two stray dogs. At last Wheeler turned and slunk away, muttering angrily under his breath as he went. The newcomer watched him go then knelt down beside Steve, who flinched.

 

"Hey, easy there kid, I ain't gonna hurt ya."

 

Steve wasn't in much of a position to argue, his breath coming in shallow wheezes and his entire body throbbing with dull aches, interspersed with sharp pain in his temples, his ribs, and his lip.

 

He felt his head gently raised off the ground and something soft tucked underneath it, then a careful dabbing at his fiercely hurting lip. All the while the other boy's voice murmured to him, warm and calm, still with that reassuring note of control tucked inside it; "Shh, I'm gonna clean you up a li'l ok? Just so's we can walk you down the sidewalk without scaring the little old ladies. You don't wanna scare no one do ya kid? Jeez but you're a mess. What's a skinny thing like you picking fights with a jerk like Wheeler for anyhow? No, don't try to talk, just breathe for me, can you do that? Breathe deep as you can and hold it in, one, two, that's it, now let it out. And in again, one, two. You're doin' great kid. Breathe out for me now. See, you're a natural." 

 

Steve couldn't help but wheeze a laugh at that and he sensed more than saw the other boy's reciprocal grin.

 

"You still breathing, kid?"

 

"Steve," the skinny boy managed to gasp with a bloody smile at his new found ally, "And I ain't no kid."

 

"Coulda fooled me, _kid_ ," chuckled his benefactor, taking Steve's bony hand in his own and shaking it once, "James Barnes. You reckon you can stand?"

 

"I reckon I can try," nodded Steve, his breathing beginning to settle deeper in his narrow chest.

 

Between them they managed to get the smaller boy to his feet and out of the alleyway, Steve leaning heavily on Bucky as the larger boy kept up a running commentary of wisecracks.

 

“Where d’you live anyhow?” Bucky eventually asked as they limped along.

 

“Two blocks from here, near the docks. Aw hell, I’m gonna fetch it from my ma coming home like this. Tore my shirt and everything!” Steve looked down at himself and knew the bruises and the split lip were the least of his worries; the ripped and bloodied shirt with dirty boot prints across the chest and stomach were going to land him in real hot water with his ma, whether she was ill or not.

 

“You wanna lay over at my place a while?” Bucky offered, “I live down the docks too. Maybe we can get you cleaned up some and stitch up your shirt so your ma’ll never know.”

 

Steve smiled gratefully, “You sure? I mean, that’d be swell if it ain’t too much hassle for ya.”

 

“No hassle at all,” grinned Bucky, “My pops ain’t home much and my ma, uh, well she ain’t around no more, so I got the quarters to myself. Be nice to have some company.”

 

The two boys staggered towards Bucky’s empty apartment and by the time Steve got home later that night he was clean as a new penny and sporting a fixed up shirt into the bargain. His ma pursed her lips at the inexpert stitching but said nothing, grateful for once that her stubborn son had taken pains not to come home fresh from a brawl.

 

“G’night ma,” Steve said, pressing a dutiful kiss to her sweaty forehead, “Hope you feel better in the mornin’.”

 

“Don’t forget your prayers, boy,” she called out, stern despite the tremor in her voice.


	2. Chapter 2

"Steven Grant Rogers if you don't get your skinny ass back into bed so help me, I will tie you to the goddamn thing!"

 

Bucky stood in the doorway of their shared bedroom, blocking the sunlight as he glared down at Steve who was perched on the edge of his single bed.

 

It had been four months since Steve’s mother had passed away on a day of bright sunshine and the two boys had been living together in a shitty tenement apartment ever since, mostly at Bucky’s insistence. When Steve’s ma had finally succumbed to her disease he’d been just sixteen and made a ward of the state, but the nuns at the orphanage had turned a blind eye to his ‘running away’; they had their hands full with the younger children as it was and were happy enough to see the back of a sickly adolescent.

 

Steve hadn’t been well for the rest of the summer after his ma’s death and well into autumn, his grief seeming to paralyse his already weak immune system and leaving him prey to summer colds and autumnal chills. Bucky thanked his lucky stars that so far nothing more serious had struck, but the air was getting colder every morning and with winter would come the threat of pneumonia and influenza...

 

Thankfully, it was just a chill that had kept Steve bed bound and out of school this last week, and today, just like yesterday, his thin chest was shining with sweat and his sunken cheeks were flushed, his bony hands clasped in his lap in an attempt to hide the way they were shaking.

 

"I gotta go to school, Buck," said Steve, his voice a soft rasp, every word costing him effort.

 

"You gotta get back in bed," stated Bucky flatly, "You ain't well. Don't make me threaten ya 'cause you know it ain't just talk. I swear before the lord almighty I will get your Sunday necktie and I will tie you to that bed frame, god help me I will!"

 

Steve was making his predisposition to debilitating illnesses of all varieties no easier on himself by forcing his sickly body out of bed every day to go to art school. Bucky knew that Steve felt guilty about missing even a day of class because a college education had been his mother’s last gift to him, his meagre inheritance spent on school fees so that Steve could have a shot at really making something of his gift for drawing, but with most of his time spent either in the school sick bay or laid up in bed in their cheap apartment, he didn’t feel he was doing right by her.

 

"Bucky-" Steve began, but he descended instantly into a fit of wheezy coughing, his thin chest heaving and his sharp ribs threatening to burst the pale skin that stretched over them. It broke Bucky’s heart to watch, especially with the noise of younger kids playing in the cold morning sunlight already filtering up through their cracked window while Steve barked his way through yet another illness.

 

Once Steve had recovered from the bout of hacking he opened his mouth to protest again, but Bucky took a firm step into the room and said harshly, “I know you feel badly Steve, but I don’t think your mama loved you so much that she wants you to join her in heaven just yet. A cough like that could turn out to be consumption in a day or two, so you just lay down before I tie you down.”

 

“I been- im-immunised,” hacked out Steve between coughs with a weak smile, “S’probably j-just whooping c-cough again.”

 

Bucky failed to find the humour in that. He pitched his voice low as he threatened, "Make me say it again Rogers, go on, I dare ya."

 

Steve teetered on the edge of arguing for a moment before throwing Bucky the fiercest glare he could manage and lowering himself gingerly back into bed.

 

"Good man," Bucky nodded approvingly, striding back into the room to pull the covers securely over Steve's thin body and ruffle his scowling friend's hair, "There's some cold tomato soup still on the cooker from last night and another tin in the cupboard which you’re gonna at least _try_ to eat. I'll bring something hot home for tonight. You keep yourself warm and make sure you drink plenty of water. Boil it first. And don't try nuthin’ stupid like sneakin' out after I've gone 'cause I'm gonna let batty Mrs Simpkins downstairs know you're laid up sick and you just know she'll rat you out to me."

 

Steve rolled his eyes and huffed, "I ain't a babe Bucky, I don't need you fussin’ over me all the time."

 

"Sure you do," grinned Bucky affectionately, unable to resist leaning down to press a kiss to Steve's warm, sweaty forehead, "Ain't no one else gonna fuss over a little punk like you."

 

Once Bucky had left Steve grudgingly followed all of his instructions, boiling a big enough pan of water that he’d be able to refill his cup from it for the rest of the day without fear of any water-borne diseases. Steve knew that Bucky was being overly dramatic in that respect - it wasn’t as if cholera was rampant in New York – but he knew he’d catch hell from Bucky if he didn’t follow orders. A small part of him that he didn’t like to look into all that often quite liked following Bucky’s orders, but he guessed it was just because it was like having his ma back again to fuss over him.

 

Around midday Steve heated up the leftover soup for himself but he didn’t open the new tin like Bucky had told him to; if he was grilled about it later he’d maybe say that he hadn’t had the strength to use the tin opener, but they would both know that he just couldn’t bear to take food out of Bucky’s mouth, even if it was being freely given.

 

For the rest of the day he slept fitfully, hacking dryly into a handkerchief and sweating and shivering by turns. He picked up a pulp novel he had been reading but he didn’t have the concentration for it and soon gave up with the words swimming before his eyes. He thumbed idly through a couple of magazines – one of them a dirty one of Bucky’s that showed just about everything there was to see on a dame and made Steve’s dick stir guiltily – but even these he had to hazily put down after a few minutes.

 

When Bucky came home after sundown he brought with him the smell of fried potatoes and a big grin. Steve was pulled from his disturbed sleep on the couch by Bucky’s hand brushing lightly over his forehead.

 

“Hey buddy,” the larger boy said gently, “You’re feelin’ cooler. How you doin’?”

 

“Better,” rasped Steve with a weak smile.

 

“Great,” Bucky’s hand lingered, brushing his fingers soothingly through Steve’s hair as he smiled, “That’s really great Stevie. You feelin’ up to dinner? I got us a treat for dessert too.” He produced a can of peaches and Steve gratefully accepted his hand up from the couch.

 

He almost regretted it a little while later when he was sitting at their dining table with Bucky forcing food enough for three people onto him. The unexpected richness of the fried potatoes made him feel bloated and lazy, and by the time Bucky opened the tin of peaches Steve was full to bursting.

 

“Come on Stevie, one more bite,” Bucky cajoled with a laugh, piling more peach segments onto his plate.

 

“M’full,” groaned Steve, trying to push the dish away but finding himself stopped by Bucky’s firm hand.

 

“Nuh uh,” Bucky shook his head smilingly, “You gotta finish this off. I spent my hard earned wages on this feast!” He nudged Steve’s plate closer and when that received no response he leaned over and laughingly pried open the other boy’s jaw, shoving in a forkful of peach.

 

“Bucky!” Steve mumbled through the thick mouthful, “You jerk!”

 

But Bucky just laughed, and when Steve managed to finally choke down the last of the fruit the brunet waved him off to bed saying, “I’ll clean up, you look beat. Go to bed, take some of them knock out drops so you sleep easier.”

 

“They make my head hurt,” complained Steve, but he did as he was told, sloping off to the bedroom and leaving Bucky to do the washing up.

 

Steve pulled out the first aid box from under his bed and found the little bottle labelled ‘chloral hydrate’. He wrinkled his nose at the thought of the occasional headaches and nausea it induced but Bucky was right, he would sleep much better with a few drops mixed into his water.

 

Bucky stepped into the bedroom a half hour later to find Steve slumped unconscious on his bed with the gas lamp still on beside him. Out of habit rather than alarm he checked the smaller boy’s pulse and breathing and rolled him onto his side, which seemed to ease his lungs sometimes. Then, safe in the knowledge that the curtains were still drawn tight and Steve was out cold, he leant down to press a kiss to the blond’s forehead like a worried mother with a sickly child.

 

“Sleep tight Stevie,” he whispered tenderly, turning out the light and tucking himself up in his own bed across the room.


	3. Chapter 3

"C'mon Stevie, come to bed," Bucky whined, shivering under his threadbare blanket. The apartment was freezing and Bucky knew, despite the tightly drawn curtains and the layers of newspaper that they'd tacked up over the windows in a meagre effort to keep warm, that snow was falling outside. Their busted radiator emitted more steam than heat and Bucky worried that the damp it encouraged throughout the flat did Steve more harm than good, but even its poor warmth was better than nothing so Bucky just kept it running and continued to harangue their landlord about it every week when he walked over to the old man’s house to pay their rent.

 

"Shut up, I'm bein' as quick as I can!" Steve was on the other side of the room gathering up the blankets from his own bed, already wrapped up in two pairs of slacks, an under shirt beneath two shirts, a pair of woollen socks, a thick scarf, and a sweater of Bucky's that they'd argued over for near twenty minutes until Bucky had simply smacked the smaller boy upside the head and yanked it over Steve's protesting shoulders.

 

Finally Steve shivered his way over to Bucky's single bed and dumped the blankets on top before sliding beneath the covers alongside his room mate. Bucky immediately curled his larger body around Steve and their shared heat was an immense improvement to the situation, though Steve's teeth continued to chatter as they bundled the extra blankets around themselves.

 

After a while the pair of them began to warm up and their frozen clinging soon relaxed into casual embrace, Steve lying on his side with Bucky's warm chest at his back, strong arms wrapped around skinny shoulders, and thighs and calves entwined. Bucky's breathing soon evened out, soft snores rumbling along Steve's spine.

 

This was the first winter in two years that Steve hadn't come down with a bout of pneumonia or ‘flu and he knew he had Bucky to thank for that. Bucky cooking hot food every night and snapping at Steve to eat his damn dinner before it went cold, Bucky forcing extra layers of clothing on Steve even when he himself went out into the biting winds with only a shirt. Bucky caging food stamps and coming home every day with a slightly bruised apple and a shrug because, "My mama used to say 'an apple a day keeps the doctor away' so it's worth a try". And Bucky sharing his bed with Steve every night even though at first Steve had protested that he wasn't a fairy.

 

Only he wasn't so sure of that last part any more.

 

Steve liked girls. He knew he liked girls because he'd gotten hard in his trousers when he was sixteen and Joyce Harrison had let him kiss her and touch her breasts over her blouse during one of his more successful double dates with Bucky and his various dames. And a year or so later, when Betty Richardson had moaned in his ear in a fluttery voice and pulled him on top of her, pressing a rubber into his hand, he'd been unable to stop grinning afterwards for a solid hour. Just because he didn’t have as much luck with the dames as handsome, smooth-talking Bucky did, it didn’t mean he didn’t _like_ them just as much.

 

Steve _didn't_ like the queens who paraded themselves around the docks where Bucky worked hauling crates, always rouging their cheeks and catcalling the sailors. He didn't hate them like some men did, wasn’t disgusted by them exactly, but they sure didn't get him hard like the curve of a gal's hip or the swell of a breast.

 

Bucky shifted in his sleep and his thigh dragged in between Steve's legs, making the smaller boy shiver with something that was definitely not cold.

 

Steve wasn't a fairy, but there was something about Bucky that made him almost wish he was... Not that Bucky had ever shown any interest in that sort of thing himself, stepping out with a new dame on his arm every Friday night. Bucky wasn't a fairy either, Steve was sure enough of that. And yet sometimes, when they woke up on wintry mornings tangled up in each other like they were now, sour breath in each other's faces and their legs all wrapped together, Steve would catch Bucky looking at him a certain way, a glint of curious devilment in his eyes, and neither of them would be quick about disentangling themselves, hands lingering on waists and feet staying tucked cosily together far longer than was strictly necessary, or even usual between friends.

 

Once, Steve had woken up with Bucky's hard cock pressing into the small of his back. More often than not, his own cock was hard when he woke up of a morning and he knew it didn't mean anything, but the way that Bucky had stayed pressed up against him like that, both of them awake and aware of it, had kept him warm for the rest of the day.

 

Steve snuggled deeper into the covers and the protective embrace of Bucky's warmth, a contented little sigh escaping his lips as Bucky nuzzled his nose sleepily into the back of Steve's neck. And if both of them woke up hard the next morning, with Steve half draped over Bucky's chest and his cock pressing into hollow of Bucky's hip, well, it didn't necessarily mean anything at all.

 

**

 

Bucky inhaled, held the tobacco smoke deep in his lungs, then exhaled in a plume after making certain he was still downwind of Steve's sensitive lungs. Cigarettes were a treat at this time of year when heating bills sapped most of their income and Bucky savoured the warmth of the smoke in his body, knowing it would be his last for a week or so. The carton had been a Christmas gift from Steve a week before, along with a brand new silver Zippo lighter, and Bucky had made it last longer than any other pack he’d ever had.

 

"I was thinkin'- " he paused to take another slow drag.

 

"There's a first time for everything," murmured Steve with a smirk as he adjusted the perspective on the sketch he was making of his best friend. Bucky was all angles as he leaned halfway out the window, being as careful as he could to keep the smoke outside, while Steve perched on the couch at the other end of the room swaddled in two blankets with his sketch book in his lap.

 

At first Steve hadn’t wanted to accept the little pad, arguing that he couldn’t possibly reciprocate, his own gift paling in comparison to the thick, moleskin-bound pages, but Bucky had seen the longing in Steve’s eyes and pressed it on the smaller boy regardless.

 

"Yuck it up funnyman," groaned Bucky, "What I mean is, what if I joined the army? Now that I’m eighteen they’d take me."

 

"The army?" Steve echoed, surprised. He knew Bucky's late father had been an officer and he'd grown up on army bases but Bucky had never before expressed an interest in a military life.

 

"Dock work don't pay so good in winter and there's talk of more strikes," Bucky shrugged, "In the army you get steady wages, you get trained up, you even get rations. I ran into an old friend of my pop’s the other day and he says he gets twenty-five dollars a month!”

 

"You also get shot at," said Steve wryly.

 

"Only in Europe," rejoined Bucky, "The US army ain't likely to end up there again, not unless every poor vet down in Hooverville up and forgets how bad our first world tour went… If I joined up I could keep us both, and you could just work on your art. If I made officer I'd even get a pension someday."

 

Steve frowned as he filled in the shading of Bucky's fingers holding the cigarette, "I dunno, Buck. Don't we do okay? You haulin' and me paintin' signs when I can find it, we usually make rent and we never go hungry. Well, not much."

 

Bucky's expression darkened as he inhaled again, "Don't you ever want more than that Stevie? Scraping to get by and barely making it. Never havin’ time to really sit down and draw like I know you wanna. Some day I want to see you in a real apartment with hot water and windows that shut properly in winter. You deserve to be wearing nice shirts and silk neck ties and decent shoes. You shouldn't have to worry about whether or not we'll be eating dinner or if you can afford drugs when you’re sick. You deserve so much more than we got Steve, don't you want more’n we got?"

 

"All I want is sittin' right here," said Steve softly, instantly blushing a furious pink as he worked his pencil over and over the lines of shadows around Bucky's feet, “Wh-what I mean is, I don’t need no more’n a roof over our heads and the clothes on our backs. But I guess I _could_ stand to be without a jerk who can’t manage to keep still for five lousy minutes so’s I can draw him.”

 

“Punk!” laughed Bucky, throwing the empty cigarette carton at Steve and striking him in the left shoulder, “Alright. You don’t want me to join up, I won’t. But some day Stevie, some day I’ll make it big and then you’ll be sorry, stuck down here in the dockyard tenements while I’m living it up in a Manhattan penthouse! Don’t need no more’n we got, my ass.”

 

Steve shrugged, “I’m a simple guy. Just remember to come back and visit old Stevie Rogers sometime when you ain’t too busy countin’ out your money.”

 

“Dumb punk,” Bucky muttered, “Like I’d ever leave you anyhow. You’d be dead in a day.”

 

Steve rolled his eyes, “Yeah Buck. I’d die without you watching over me every second of every hour,” he said in that sassy little voice he sometimes used when Bucky was getting too motherly over him.

 

“Goddamn right you would,” nodded Bucky, finishing his last cigarette in contemplative silence before closing the window and joining Steve under the blankets on the couch.


	4. Chapter 4

 "Rogers! Lay down before I knock you down, goddamn it!"

 

"Aw come on Buck, I'll be fine!" Steve laughed, the midsummer sunlight almost blinding as it reflected off his sickly pale skin. On a day like today the beach was crowded, and Steve laughingly ducked out of Bucky's reach between two elderly sunbathers reclining on their deck chairs.

 

"Get back here you little punk!" Bucky growled, brandishing the little tin of sunscreen he’d picked up at the drug store that morning. But he was smiling, and when Steve darted off down the sand towards the water he gave the smaller boy a decent head start before chasing after him, laughing freely.

 

"I can look after myself Bucky!" Steve yelled over his shoulder, grinning widely as he splashed waist-deep into the water.

 

Bucky barreled in after him, grabbing the skinnier boy around the middle and hurling them both bodily into the surf. They surfaced together, wiping salt out of their eyes as Bucky kicked water at Steve and laughed, "The hell you can Rogers! I'll bet a dime to a dollar that you come home red as the lights on Coney Island tonight and who'll be looking after you then huh?"

 

Steve ducked underwater and emerged a second later with his cheeks puffed out before spitting a graceful arc of seawater right into Bucky's face.

 

"Oh, that's it!" laughed Bucky, splashing at his friend in retaliation, "Now you're gonna get it!"

 

He lunged after Steve and thanks purely to his longer reach soon had the other boy in a grapple, managing to slap half the tin of lotion over Steve's squirming shoulders and back before a well-aimed elbow snapped into his ribs and made him drop it.

 

"That's dirty pool!" shrieked Bucky laughingly as Steve half ran, half swam away from him, a wicked grin lighting up his thin features and making Bucky's chest tighten in a way that seemed to be happening more and more often. Maybe Steve's heart problems were contagious, Bucky tried to convince himself sometimes, even though he knew full well that wasn't the reason behind the fluttering in his gut when Steve's light blond hair glowed in the sun and his laughter coloured the summer air.

 

"Whatcha gonna do about it?" taunted Steve, feeling safe at a few yards' distance and still with sun lotion dripping messily across his shoulders.

 

Bucky bared his teeth in a predatory grin and dived underwater, striking out confidently in Steve's direction. A few seconds later his hands closed around skinny ankles and he broke the surface with a shocked Steve balancing precariously on his broad, tanned shoulders.

 

"How d'you like that?" Bucky challenged, Steve's thighs clenching in surprise around his neck and his hands scrabbling for purchase in Bucky's hair.

 

"Put me down!" Steve hollered, "Dammit Bucky, you put me down!"

 

Bucky laughed, liking the feel of Steve's fingers knotted in his hair, "Nope. You gotta ask nicer than that Stevie."

 

" _Please_ put me down," Steve gritted out, yanking hard on Bucky's hair and making the larger boy chuckle.

 

"I'm just try'na look out for you," Bucky teased, swaying from side to side so that Steve was forced to hold on even tighter just to keep both of them upright, "I know you ain't the strongest swimmer, wouldn't want you to get into difficulties."

 

"Bucky!" Steve snapped, and the high pitched edge of frustration in his voice stirred something in Bucky that was best left unstirred, "Put me down you jerk!"

 

"If you're sure," grinned Bucky, and felt a little smug about the fact that he was still able to shrug his shoulders even with Steve's weight atop him. Next second he squatted down into the water then shot up again, launching Steve off his shoulders and into a graceless somersault through the air before the smaller boy landed with an indignant squawk and a loud splash a few yards away.

 

He came up spluttering, blond hair plastered wetly to his head, and Bucky was laughing too hard to even to dodge the tackle that knocked him off his feet and back into the surf.

 

They stayed in the water for hours, wrestling and goofing off, keeping cool in the sticky midday heat by ducking each other under the waves and having races along the shore line. Bucky loved these rare, lazy summer days at the beach with Steve, even if the skinny boy invariably went home with a souvenir sunburn.

 

Bucky had taught Steve how to swim four summers before – the summer that Steve’s ma had died the lessons had been a welcome distraction from Steve’s grief - and the blond was competent in the water, the coolness keeping his breathing easy despite the near-stifling humidity of a New York summer. The sea was a level playing field as well, rendering Bucky as weightless and easily lifted as Steve was and providing a buffer for their wrestling matches, Bucky never having to worry about accidentally knocking Steve too hard and hurting him. It was a rare freedom indeed and Bucky knew the value of it.

 

It was sundown by the time the pair of them emerged from the ocean, dripping and wrinkly-fingered, panting from their hours-long exertions and both grinning tiredly. They bought an ice cream each with their trolley money and walked back to the tenement instead, sleepy and satisfied by the day's vacation.

 

“I need a bath,” Bucky grumbled when they reached their little apartment. He had tried to run a hand through his hair out of habit; it was sticking up all at odd angles, crusty with salt, and he looked downright ridiculous. For his part Steve was shivery with what Bucky suspected was heat stroke and was already bright pink from his forehead to his waist and would be sore and peeling for days.

 

Together they hauled some cold water from the washroom down the hall, painstakingly heated it on the stove, and filled their primitive tin washtub. There were communal showers in the washroom of course but they were cold water only and Steve was liable to get sick from even a quick douse in the freezing water. Bucky wished they could afford to live somewhere with hot running water and private plumbing. The cold water wasn’t so bad in summer, but in winter you had to set aside two hours just to heat enough water on the stove to bathe in, and if you left the tub filled overnight you’d have to crack the scree of ice over it with your knuckles the next morning. As if winters weren’t hard enough on Steve as it was, he didn’t need to get chilblains too just from washing his face of a morning.

 

“You go first,” Steve insisted, waving away Bucky’s protests and heading into their tiny kitchen, “If I let you cook you’ll burn the whole block down! Go.”

 

By the time Bucky emerged, clean and salt-free, the house smelled like stew and boiled potatoes. He was bone tired but he couldn’t resist sneaking up behind Steve as the smaller boy hummed tunelessly and stirred the pot of stew, startling him enough to turn the air blue.

 

“Jesus wept! Chrissake, Bucky, give a guy a heart attack why don’t ya! God.”

 

Bucky grinned as Steve spat curses, the heat stroke clearly aggravating his mood, “You got a dirty mouth on you Stevie, you know that? Mind I don’t wash it out for ya, that carbolic irritates your skin, lord knows what it’d do to your tongue.”

 

Steve rolled his eyes and headed towards the tub, calling back, “Make sure dinner don’t burn will ya?”

 

Bucky couldn’t fail to notice that Steve was already starting to move stiffly, his sunburned shoulders paining him, and he wasn’t surprised when a few minutes later he heard a small voice call out, “Buck? Can you c’mere a minute?”

 

Bucky ignored the little jolt in his gut and turned down the heat on the stove so the stew wouldn’t be ruined before he went to see what was the matter. As he’d expected Steve was hunched over in the tub, waist deep in tepid water and his knobbly knees sticking up into his chest as he tried to reach around to scrub his back. The skin there was an angry red and Steve’s shoulders were quivering but the smaller boy was still gritting his teeth and trying to scrub there like an idiot.

 

“Quit it, you’re gonna hurt yourself,” Bucky scolded, “Gimme that.”

 

He took the wash cloth from Steve’s clenched hand and dipped it into the water then very gently wiped it over Steve’s sunburned back. Steve’s shaking shoulders immediately seemed to lose some of their tension and he made a comfortable, quiet noise in the back of his throat, though his teeth were still chattering. The carbolic would only make the burn worse, Bucky knew from experience, and so he didn’t bother with it, just repeatedly wetting the washcloth and dabbing delicately until Steve was rinsed clean of sand and salt water. Then very gently he coaxed Steve to lie back as best he could in the restricted space and he washed his hair, careful fingers massaging through thin blond strands, until that too was clean and Steve’s eyes were closed in contentment and his breathing was deep and even.

 

Things like this seemed to happen a lot between Steve and Bucky, yet as far as Bucky knew it wasn’t normal. Sharing clothes, sharing beds, sharing baths, it was just as natural between them as sharing conversation, always had been, and there was nothing inherently abnormal about that; Bucky had grown up wearing hand-me-down clothes from cousins and uncles, tough-guy marines often shared bunks with their comrades-in-arms, and you could see men bathing together buck-naked in the public baths every day. Yet something inside of both boys warned them not to discuss these private moments, though neither could say exactly why.

 

Bucky also knew not to talk about how these moments sometimes made him feel, even to Steve, because it wasn’t just a little bit _unusual_ that he got hard when he caught Steve’s smell on his own shirt or brushed a wet cloth down the sharp islands of his best friend’s spine, it was downright fucking _queer_. Bucky wasn’t no fairy and neither was Steve, even though he sometimes got lip from the other boys for being so skinny and prettily blond.

 

Bucky had stuck it up a fair few girls by now and he’d liked it - loved it even, their soft bodies and fluttery voices - but there was no escaping the fact that as he wrung out the wash cloth and set it over the edge of the tub to dry he was pitching at half mast.

 

“You’re all done buddy,” he said quietly, running his fingers through Steve’s wet hair one last time, “I’m gonna go check on dinner,” and he left the room before Steve had a chance to come out of his blissful daze.

 

Later when they were in their beds, Steve shivery on his stomach, covered with a wet towel that Bucky had insistently laid over his burning, aching back and the window above him open to stir some cooling breeze into his lungs, Bucky made a fist around his cock and jammed his other hand into his mouth as he came, thoughts of Steve supplicant and easy in the tub forcing their way past the pretty girls he tried to think of.


	5. Chapter 5

_Even if I can’t fight back and win / I can stand up for the shape I’m in / Taking pride in losing / Ain’t no sin_

\- "I Love The Army", From Here to Eternity

 

* * *

 

 

"What in the hell happened to you?" Bucky shot off his bed, abandoning the girly magazine he had been idly flicking through and rushed over to Steve, who had just appeared in the dark doorway sporting a black eye, a bruised jaw, and a face half covered in blood from a cut high on his forehead just under his hairline, the downy baby hairs there matted red.

 

Stubborn jerk that he was, Steve merely shrugged as if his injuries were no big deal, "I got in a scrape."

 

"Oh really?" snapped Bucky, already wiping at the blood with a spit-dampened handkerchief like a worried mother, "I thought you musta got busted up like this pickin’ daisies! Jesus Steve, how'd you do so good in school and still get to be such a dumbass?"

 

Steve gritted his teeth and tried to swat Bucky away as the handkerchief dabbed painfully into the cut but the larger boy merely grabbed both of his skinny wrists in one hand and held his struggles at bay while continuing to tend his hurts.

 

"Bucky, you can't- "

 

"Oh I can't?" snarled Bucky, tightening his grip around Steve's wrists to almost painful and using his free hand to turn Steve's head and inspect the heavy purple bruise that was blooming along his jaw, "Can't what? Can't hold you down? Lookit your hands Rogers, then tell me I can't. Can't try to keep your stupid ass out of trouble? If it means tying you to a goddamn post like a dog on a leash then I damn well can. The one thing I  _can't_  seem to do is beat it into your thick head that fighting with fellas twice your size don't help no one! But lucky for me you're pretty darn good at finding your own beatings so I guess I don't have to!"

 

Satisfied that the bruising was superficial rather than symptomatic of something more serious, Bucky relinquished Steve's hands and fisted both of his own in the other boy's torn shirt collar threateningly, " _The hell_  Steve, the hell goes through your head sometimes, you little punk?"

 

Some nights when Steve came home after a fight he went quiet and remorseful, letting Bucky fuss over him and upbraid him for being such a dumbass, allowing his wounds to be bathed and dressed until Bucky was satisfied enough to pull him into a fierce hug and threaten to flay him if he ever came home in such a state again. Other times - times like tonight - he came home with a defiant light in his eyes, the soft blue almost eclipsed by a hard, jagged glare that lit something inside of Bucky himself that he struggled to describe, something fierce and feral, a little like the feeling he got when blood bloomed in his mouth after a punch and he knew for a fact that the other fella would be on his ass in the next two seconds.

 

Nights like tonight often ended in an ugly silence, Bucky's stubborn, exasperated desire to look after his scrawny runt of a room mate warring with Steve's stubborn, pugnacious righteousness.

 

"There was two of 'em and they were whalin' on some kid," said Steve by way of explanation, that hard gaze boring into Bucky's eyes, "Big guys, our age. The kid was maybe ten. Skinny and dirty. One of 'em said the kid was a wop. Well I said him just bein’ a wop and goin’ about his business didn't hurt neither of them so what was the problem? Then they started whalin' on me. One of ‘em had a roll of nickels in his fist. The kid got away alright I guess but they followed me all the way back here."

 

For a moment Bucky looked like _he_ was gonna start whaling on Steve as well, but instead he pulled him into a crushing hug, mashing Steve's bruised face up against his hard chest as he growled fiercely, "What am I gonna do with you, Rogers?"

 

Steve struggled a little and pushed at Bucky's sides but the larger boy had been on the receiving end of Steve's shoves more than once and he knew the gesture was only half-hearted.

 

"C'mon Buck," Steve whined, his voice muffled by Bucky's shirt, "Let up."

 

"Nuh uh," chuckled Bucky, loosening his grip just a little, "I let you go, you'll just go get yourself beat up again. I gotta keep you right here where you're safe."

 

Steve squirmed away and huffed, delicate fingers absently brushing the bruise on his jaw as he shot back, "You really do wanna keep me chained up like a dog huh?"

 

Something flashed in Bucky's eyes at that but Steve was too busy looking at the floor with a faint flush of colour rising on his cheeks to notice as he muttered defiantly, “Just you try it, see what happens… I’m going out.”

 

“Where you going?” asked Bucky, surprised. Steve sometimes got sore with him but he’d never walked out before, and it was definitely more Bucky’s style to spend a night boozing in the dock side pubs than Steve’s.

 

“Just out,” said Steve curtly, without looking up at Bucky, “S’too hot in here. I need some air.”

 

The apartment was cool in the autumn afternoon, instantly disqualifying Steve’s ruse, and Bucky couldn’t miss the way the smaller boy’s fists were clenching and unclenching. He knew in a split second of inspiration what was about to happen before he’d even decided to do it.

 

“The hell, Bucky?” Steve shrilled as both of his hands were jammed into the small of his back and held there against his struggles, “Let me up! I mean it you jerk, let me up, you ain’t the boss of me!”

 

Something about that statement piqued Bucky’s ire further and his teeth showed in a ferocious growl as he grabbed his belt off the chair he’d slung it over earlier and looped it around Steve’s wrists, securing them tightly together.

 

Steve seemed too shocked to process what had just happened, and when Bucky finally let go of him he simply stood, outraged, his mouth working soundlessly open and closed.

 

“You ain’t going out,” said Bucky curtly, “Not while you’re in a temper like this and those thugs are outside waitin’ for you, you’re liable to get yourself killed if you do. You’re gonna stay right here ‘til you’ve cooled down a little and then if you still wanna go out I’ll let you.”

 

“You son of a bitch,” spat Steve nastily, “You yellow bellied bastard! You think you can just order me around and tie me up if I don’t do what you say? You ain’t no better than them bullies outside beatin’ on that kid half their size!”

 

Bucky shrugged coolly, “You can call me whatever names you like Stevie, I’m doing this for your own good. So you can stand right there and be mad about it or you can come and sit on the sofa with me.”

 

Without waiting for an answer Bucky sloped over to their worn, old sofa and picked up the stack of True Detective magazines that Steve loved, flicking open an old Bonnie and Clyde special and beginning to read. It was at least ten minutes before Bucky heard Steve start to shift his weight from foot to foot, and another five before halting footsteps approached the sofa. When he finally looked up Steve was standing beside him with his head hanging and all the anger drained out of him.

 

“Sit down,” Bucky said gently, and without a word Steve shifted so he was sat on the floor at Bucky’s feet, moving a little awkwardly with his hands still bound behind him but definitely choosing the floor over the vacant half of the sofa. It threw Bucky a little but if that was where Steve wanted to sit then that was fine by him.

 

“You okay?” Bucky asked, reaching out a hand to comb through Steve’s thin hair, making the other boy tip his head back for more.

 

“Yeah. I’m sorry,” said Steve in a quiet voice, humming contentedly as Bucky continued to run his fingers through his hair.

 

“Do you understand why I did that?” Bucky tapped lightly at the belt still knotted around Steve’s hands.

 

“Yeah. I shoulda… I’m sorry,” Steve’s voice was small and quiet and he sounded a little lost. It was what Bucky had wanted in a way, but it was also sort of scary seeing fierce little Steve with all his fire suddenly extinguished.

 

“It’s okay, I’m not mad,” said Bucky, squeezing Steve’s shoulder comfortingly, “You don’t need to be sorry, you just need to be more careful. You want me to untie you?”

 

“No,” said Steve sharply, shifting away from Bucky’s reach, “I mean… no. I just… Not yet?” Again that lost little voice that Bucky didn’t quite know what to do with.

 

“Whatever you want Stevie,” Bucky reassured him, threading his fingers back into the blond strands and petting him again. “You want a magazine?”

 

Steve shook his head, “S’too dark, I won’t be able to read it.”

 

“You want me to read it out to you?”

 

It was an offer that Steve had declined on numerous previous occasions, just as defensive about his poor eyesight as he was about his small stature, but this time he just gave a tiny nod and leant back against the foot of the sofa as Bucky stroked his hair and began to read aloud.

 

When it eventually got too dark for even Bucky to make out the words he put down the magazine and said gently, “I’m gonna untie you now, okay Stevie?”

 

“Yeah,” Steve agreed, his voice no longer small and childlike which was encouraging, “Yeah, please.”

 

The belt dropped to the floor and Bucky pulled Steve onto the couch facing him so that he could massage the blood back into the skinny wrists that the belt had left small, red indents around.

 

“Does it hurt?” he asked quietly, unable to look Steve in the eye though not entirely sure why.

 

“Not much,” Steve replied, “I liked it after a while. Not at first, obviously. But after a while it just felt… easy? I dunno how to explain it.”

 

“You don’t have to,” said Bucky, “You still wanna go out? Those goons probably got sick of waitin’ for you and left by now.”

 

Steve shook his head no. His eyes lingered on a coil of hempen rope in the corner that Bucky had swiped from the dockyard some weeks back with the intention of fixing their broken curtain rail.

 

“Would you really do it?” the blond asked softly, “Keep me tied up like a dog?”

 

The question alarmed Bucky a little, "Nah," he said with a forced smile, slugging Steve gently in the shoulder, "Just wanna keep you safe is all. I ain’t gonna keep you prisoner."

 

“I can look after myself, Buck,” Steve grumbled, “You ain’t my mother.”

 

“Sure no ain’t!” laughed Bucky, “Your mama wouldn’t take half the shit I take from you! She’d’a taken you over her knee and tanned your hide half a dozen times for coming home all messed up. Shirt torn and all bloody. I’ll bet old Saint Peter is holdin’ her back right now, her spittin’ that she oughta teach her son a lesson!”

 

Steve smiled a little sadly at that, “Guess the Irish temper runs in my family.”

 

“Sure as shit,” agreed Bucky, “Just promise me it won’t happen again, at least not this week. Or next week. No fightin’ for two weeks Steve, can you handle that?”

 

“Bucky…” Steve gave him a pained look, “You know I don’t go out lookin’ for trouble, but I can’t stand by while some poor kid gets the tar kicked outta him for no reason, you know I can’t.”

 

Bucky knew. Bucky had known Steve long enough to know that he could force him to take his medicine, to stay in bed when he was ill, to eat the larger portions of their meagre meals, and to take Bucky’s sweater in winter, but he could never keep him from fighting the good fight. And really, if he tried to, what sort of a man would that make Bucky? All he could do was try to keep that Irish temper in check when it was liable to get his friend in trouble, and if that meant literally tying Steve down sometimes, then okay.

 

“I know Stevie,” Bucky nodded gently, “Just… holler for me next time okay? Let me even the odds for ya. You know I don’t like seeing you all bloodied up like this.”

 

“I will,” Steve gave him a small, warm smile, “So long as you promise next time to gimme a little warning before practising your knots. I don’t mind it, but you gotta warn me first, okay?”

 

“Okay,” agreed Bucky, a little surprised and uncomfortably warmed by the fact that Steve was putting this on the table for a ‘next time’, and not really understanding why it made him feel so dirty.


	6. Chapter 6

Steve woke up with a gasp in the cold stillness of pre-dawn, his skin clammy under a light sheen of sweat, but for once it wasn't the beginning of yet another winter chill. His dick pulsed heavily and the fragments of the dream slipping quickly away from him made him moan aloud in his half-awake state. His balls were tight and his cock gave another constricted twitch, trapped beneath the now-soaked layers of his cotton shorts and two pairs of slacks. Beside him Bucky snored quietly, his face turned away even though one arm was slung haphazardly across Steve's chest. 

 

Steve lay deadly still for a minute as the aftermath of his orgasm washed over him. When he was able to think clearly again he was mortified - _sticky_ and mortified. Bucky slept inches away from him and Steve had just... fuck. It certainly wasn't the first time it had happened but usually Steve could just shuck off his shorts and discretely wipe down his sheets while Bucky slumbered on in his own bed across the room. But like this… Steve was grateful that at least he was wearing enough layers that the sheets were saved, but there was no way he'd be able to disentangle himself without waking Bucky and having the other boy see the wet patch at the front of his trousers.

 

To make matters worse, the snatches of dream that Steve was still able to recall had featured thick, brawny arms and the brush of stubble. A familiar chuckle. The rasp of scratchy rope around his wrists. A heated growl that made girls go breathy and made Steve... _well_.

 

Bucky snuffled into semi-wakefulness beside him and a sharp bolt of panic lanced through Steve's chest. Bucky was going to see him like this, what would he think? What if Steve had spoken or made some kind of noise while he was still dreaming and Bucky had heard? What if he'd said his  _name?_  Would Bucky be angry when he realised what Steve had done right there in his bed? Would he be disgusted? Would he laugh - that would be worst of all, Steve thought, if Bucky laughed at him and called him a fucking fairy and told him to get out and never come back. 

 

Steve's breath began to hitch as he spiralled into panic and beside him Bucky twisted sleepily around, turning to face the blond as he fell into hyperventilation, breath coming in short wheezes and gasps.

 

"Steve..? Steve!" Bucky was instantly alert, pressing Steve onto his back and leaning worriedly over him and oh god, oh god, any minute now Bucky would know, he'd  _know_ , and- 

 

"Hey it's okay, I got ya. It was just a bad dream is all, you're safe here with me. Can you breathe a little slower for me Stevie, can you do that?"

 

Steve shook his head in a panic, trying to squirm away, but Bucky pinned him down, one strong thigh easily restraining his flailing legs and one hand holding Steve's smaller hands above his head. Steve could feel Bucky's solid cock digging into his hip and he wasn't sure whether that was helping or hurting the situation but he couldn't stop, couldn't calm down, not with-

 

Bucky clamped his free hand firmly over Steve's face, pinching his nose shut.

 

"Shhh, yes you _can_ , just listen to me and do as I say. Breathe out through your mouth, slow, slow, that's it, good," Bucky moved his hand to release Steve's nose and closed it over his lips instead, "Okay, now nice and easy in through your nose, steady, that's it, you're doing great. Now out through the mouth, one, two, three, that's perfect Stevie, see? It's working already. In through your nose now..."

 

Bucky talked him through the attack until Steve's breathing was level again. He pulled his hand away from Steve's face and though they were still pressed tightly together the smaller boy could no longer feel the solid weight of Bucky's morning wood pressing into his side. He tried to ignore the sordid disappointment that stirred in him.

 

When Bucky was satisfied that Steve was no longer in any danger he flopped down again tiredly, curling into Steve's side with his chin resting on a sharp shoulder and his fingers stroking through wispy blond hair as he asked quietly, "Bad dream huh?" 

 

"Uh, yeah," Steve nodded, avoiding the larger boy's eyes as Bucky looked up at him and praying that he wouldn't feel the damp seeping through his trousers.

 

"Well you're okay now," Bucky affirmed, pressing his lips to Steve's neck with such casual affection that Steve almost couldn't bear it, "It's not even dawn yet, reckon you can go back to sleep?"

 

"Nah," Steve said brusquely, wriggling away from Bucky's embrace, "I need a wash, I'm going down the hall."

 

"No you ain't," whined Bucky, grabbing Steve around the waist and yanking him back under the covers, "The pipes'll be frozen, you're stayin' here." It was a Sunday morning and Bucky loved to luxuriate in bed on Sundays, always begging Steve to lay down with him even though Steve was the kind of person who just had to get up and do something the minute he was awake.

 

"Let go, Buck," growled Steve, but that was a mistake; Bucky also loved it when Steve wrestled with him and he took that growl as his cue to playfully grapple Steve back into the bed. Steve was small and surprisingly agile but Bucky had the weight advantage and he was soon straddling Steve's hips with a dopey, triumphant grin, both of Steve's hands trapped beneath Bucky's knees and the blankets rucked up at the end of the bed.

 

"Say 'uncle'," taunted Bucky.

 

"Get off me!" snarled Steve, his cheeks flaming red and tears threatening at the corners of his eyes.

 

Bucky realised something was wrong then but he knew Steve well enough to know that the smaller boy wouldn't talk unless forced to. So he remained perched where he was, cocking his head to the side and asking, "What's wrong Stevie? Your chest still hurting?"

 

"It ain't that, just... Stop that!" Steve yelped suddenly with a mortified expression. All Bucky had done was shift his weight a little, not wanting to crush Steve's pelvis under him and- _oh_.

 

"Oh," said Bucky, eyes widening a little as Steve glared pointedly away, teeth gritted and shame burning in his eyes.

 

"Hey... look at me," Bucky soothed after a moment's awkward pause, leaning down to stroke a hand over Steve's smooth cheek and forcing him to look up and meet Bucky's eyes, "It's okay, it's normal. Was it the first time, or- "

 

"No!" Steve spat angrily, unable to explain why the question made him feel so unmanned, " _No_ , I- it's happened plenty. I just never meant it to happen when you and me were sharing is all. It's wrong."

 

"It ain't wrong," rejoined Bucky, climbing gingerly off Steve and laying down next to him in the bed again, pulling Steve into a back-to-chest hug despite the smaller man's token resistance, "You can't control that kinda stuff. Can you control your dreams, Stevie? If you can you oughta teach me how, 'cause I'd be dreamin' like that every night of the week!"

 

The joke fell flat and Bucky tried another tack, knowing how sensitive Steve could get over his masculinity. He murmured quietly, "I’ve done it too. In bed with you, I mean. Coupl'a weeks ago. Woke up all sticky and warm but it wasn't a big deal. I just cleaned myself off and made us both coffee. It don't make you queer or nuthin'."

 

Bucky's confession seemed to drain some of the tension out of Steve's pointed shoulders.

 

"What was the dream about?" Bucky continued, yawning, his eyelids fluttering shut again as he spoke, "Some dame you seen down at Coney or in the dance halls I bet."

 

"Don't remember," grunted Steve, the words  _it don't make you queer_  running over and over like a mantra through his mind.

 

"Sure you do," wheedled Bucky slyly against his shoulder, "You just don't wanna share your best gal with me. I'll bet she was a lovely little thing wasn't she Stevie? Dark hair maybe, like Vivien Leigh, a real spitfire 'cause I know you like it when dames get all forward with you. I like quiet blondes myself, skinny ones, dames so light you can sweep them up off their feet. Curves on a gal are great, I mean I could spend all day staring at that picture of Rita Hayworth you drew last summer, but sometimes it's nice to feel big you know? Like a man. In control. Skinny dames are always so grateful you're even talkin' to 'em that they just... they just let you pick 'em up and kiss 'em silly against some wall somewhere, out the back of the dance hall maybe, or behind the movie theatre..."

 

Bucky's sleep-doped mind was obviously wandering as he fantasised aloud but so were his hands; one heavy palm closed over Steve's jutting hip bone, strong fingers dipping into the hollow and squeezing almost hard enough to bruise the thin skin there. Steve's breath hitched as Bucky shifted behind him and he could feel the other boy's cock again, half hard after its earlier softening, a growing presence that filled him with wanting and made the stickiness in his trousers feel momentarily erotic rather than just perverted.

 

"Bucky, you're- " Steve shifted around to face his friend, the modest swell of his arse brushing Bucky's cock as he did so and making Bucky gasp, "Stevie... god."

 

"Bucky..." Steve faltered, finding himself suddenly inches away from his friend's flushed face, Bucky's eyes screwed tightly closed and his lips parted slightly, invitingly.

 

Steve shifted again, on purpose this time, pressing his pelvis into Bucky's experimentally, finding that his own cock was stirring again. Bucky whined quietly at the contact and Steve felt sweat break out over his brow as he realised he wanted to kiss that noise right out of Bucky's mouth.

 

"Bucky... can I..?" Steve whispered, half afraid and half aroused as Bucky's eyes flickered dazedly open, dark eyelashes that Steve had never really noticed before framing hungry, hooded eyes.

 

"Yeah Stevie, yeah," replied Bucky, his voice quiet but sure, "If you want to... kiss me, Stevie."

 

Steve leaned in, closing the two inches between them and pressing his lips against Bucky's. It felt clumsy at first, both of them too afraid to deepen the contact, but eventually Bucky gave a needy little whine and licked at Steve's lips, coaxing them open and probing his tongue gently into Steve's mouth.

 

They kissed for a long time with increasing urgency, the sky beyond their taped-up windows beginning to lighten before Steve pulled away a little breathlessly. Bucky was laid out half on top of him and looking down at him adoringly, one hand cradling Steve's face with his fingers running through his hair.

 

"What are we doing?" breathed Steve, looking up at Bucky searchingly.

 

Bucky grinned down at him, that cocky grin that made nice girls blush and not so nice girls drop their panties, "I'm kissing you silly is what I'm doing. God Steve, I been wantin' this for the longest time."

 

Steve turned his head away when Bucky tried to dive in for another kiss, but he was smiling shyly as he did so, "C'mon Buck, really? _Me?_ If you wanted to try with a fella I know some of the fairies down at the docks woulda let you have a go for a dime."

 

Bucky slapped Steve's face lightly with a mock scandalised look, "Steven Rogers, are you implying that _I_ would have to pay? James Buchanan Barnes  _does not_  pay for tail. The fairies down the docks would pay  _me_  to be in your position right now!"

 

Steve laughed and tried to shove Bucky off him but Bucky wouldn't budge. Steve chuckled and quirked his hips to dislodge the larger boy but to no avail. Bucky was still grinning and Steve growled playfully as they started wrestling in earnest, limbs tangling as they shoved and grunted at each other. Bucky leaned down and nipped cheekily at Steve's throat, and when that made Steve gasp Bucky did it again, harder. He ended up with Steve pinned beneath him once again, strong thighs straddling skinny hips as Bucky licked and sucked and bit at Steve's shoulders and chest until he'd pulled a number of bruises to the surface of that alabaster skin.

 

Steve was moaning and arching up against Bucky's mouth and both of them were hard, grinding together in a sloppy rhythm. Bucky bit down hard on Steve's jutting collarbone and Steve let go of a high pitched whine, his hands clenching spasmodically in the sheets. Bucky hadn't even noticed that Steve had stopped touching him, had been too focussed on painting the ring of bruises under Steve's shirt collar line, but now he pulled away and linked his fingers with Steve's, gently drawing Steve's hands above his head and pinning them there with a questioning look in his eyes. Steve pushed against the restraining hand once but Bucky held him, and the tension in the smaller boy's shoulders drained immediately, a content little smile tugging at his lips and lighting up his eyes.

 

Bucky took that as a green light and dived back into sucking hickeys through Steve's skin, rutting against him like a dog in heat while Steve squirmed and gasped but never made any real effort to get away. Bucky had done this once or twice with girls, held them down while kissing over their breasts and then further down their soft bodies, and he knew he got a real kick out of it. But Steve seemed to like it more than any girl had ever done, his eyes screwed tightly shut and his breath coming in little whimpery pants as the hard line of his cock rubbed roughly against Bucky's through too many layers of trousers.

 

"Stevie, lookit you, god..." Bucky pulled away to drink in the sight of Steve spread out beneath him, his three layers of shirts half unbuttoned and yanked down as far as they could go, the skin beneath them mottled a soft purple from Bucky's lips, thin blonde hair dishevelled, lips wet and red and open, the front of his trousers stained and straining... 

 

Bucky let go of Steve's pinned hands to unbutton his shirts further but Steve whined breathily, "No..." and with a hot flare of lust Bucky understood. He gripped Steve’s hands tighter and pressed down possessively.

 

"Okay, no problem, we can do it like this. Fuck, Stevie, I'm close already just seeing you like this..." Bucky squeezed Steve's wrists more roughly than before, tiny bones shifting under strong fingers, but Steve never made a sound except for a breathy moan as Bucky thrust against him again, increasing his pace until they might as well have been fucking, all sweat and hot friction between them and the echoes of their muffled groans filling the small room.

 

Steve came first, the sharp inhalation and low, quiet moan that followed it music to Bucky's ears. Even when he was done Steve kept tilting his hips up and panting Bucky's name like a litany, urging Bucky on until he too was shuddering and grunting through an orgasm, his hips stuttering against the sharp little body held beneath him.

 

Bucky collapsed hard onto Steve but the blond didn't seem to mind, bringing his hands up at last to wrap around Bucky's broad back and rub soothing, absent-minded circles there. In the haze of bliss Bucky dimly thought it a waste that Steve had had to come in his trousers twice and wondered what it would have been like to use his mouth on Steve the way he liked to on girls. An angry internal voice upbraided him for thinking like a fucking queer boy, but a calmer one argued that if what he'd just done with Steve made him queer then that was just fine by him because it had been the best damn rut of his life. He thought Steve would maybe like it if Bucky took him in his mouth. Girls always got breathless and sometimes even screamed when he did it for them, and Bucky knew he'd want to make Steve scream if he could.

 

But in that moment neither boy was likely to be coming back to full mast any time soon, laying as they were breathless and entwined, both sticky in their trousers. It was Steve who eventually broke the silence, just as the sweat drying on Bucky's back was beginning to turn cold and goosepimply under the two shirts he was still wearing.

 

"Well I guess it's laundry day."

 

Bucky laughed and rolled off his new lover, yanking the rucked up blankets from the end of the bed and back over the two of them. "Nuh uh, it's Sunday. Sundays are for sleeping. C'mon Stevie, just this once stay in bed with me? The laundry can wait."

 

Steve made a show of resistance, grumbling and shrugging off Bucky's possessive hands, but he allowed himself to be pulled into an embrace docilely enough and soon his soft, deep breathing mimicked Bucky's own, the two boys sleeping soundly in one another's arms.


	7. Chapter 7

_If I’m to survive come what may / Then love me forever today_

_\- "Love Me Forever Today", From Here to Eternity_

 

* * *

 

 

As a general rule Bucky hated winter, but ever since that first stolen night with Steve he’d thanked his lucky stars every evening when the sun set early and called a halt to the day’s work so he could go home and draw the curtains right away without incurring any kind of neighbourly suspicion. Spring had brought with it lighter evenings and a severe bout of hay fever for Steve, but that hadn’t stopped the two boys from still going at it every opportunity they got – Steve’s ma would have rolled her eyes and called it ‘spring fever’ just like she always had done when she’d taken her little boy for a walk and had to shield his eyes from the adolescent couples necking in the park like animals in heat.

 

"Stevie... god, I want you," growled Bucky against Steve's neck, the smaller boy trapped beneath his weight, both of them sprawled together on Steve's tiny single bed. Their slowly grinding bodies were bathed in the last glow of sunset filtering through the tightly shut curtains and their breathy groans cloaked by the soft strains of the wireless.

 

"I'm yours Buck, I'm yours," moaned Steve quietly as Bucky's teeth closed over his pulse point, not biting hard enough to leave any marks but lighting up Steve's nerves nonetheless.

 

"No, I mean... I want to- to go all the way. With you. Chrissake, I wanna feel you Stevie, I want you so bad."

 

Bucky was hard and Steve could feel the other boy's wanting pressing into his skinny thigh, but suddenly he wasn't feeling so hot himself.

 

"You want me like a dame?"

 

Bucky caught onto the shift in atmosphere immediately and pulled off Steve, sitting back on his heels and letting the other boy sit up. Steve looked uncomfortable and Bucky knew his next words needed to be chosen carefully.

 

"I want you every way I can have you Stevie, but I don't want anything you're not okay with doing...  I want you, I wanna go all the way with you. But, uh, I guess what I actually meant was, I guess...  _I_ wanna be the dame..."

 

It was hard for Bucky to say that, even though usually he couldn't stop running his mouth when he was hot. It came naturally to him and most dames seemed to like it. Steve certainly did; Bucky often said things that made Steve blush and gasp with the dirtiness of it, but wanting this - _saying_ it - was somehow dirtier than anything else he'd ever whispered into the blond's ear. He couldn't even bring himself to meet Steve's eyes as he said it, afraid of seeing rejection or disgust staring back at him.

 

"You wanna..? You'd really let me do that to you?" 

 

Steve didn't sound disgusted. He sounded a little bit scared and a lot surprised. Bucky managed to draw his eyes up to look at his friend and the blond was staring back at him with his kiss-reddened lips agape.

 

"Yeah," nodded Bucky, "I wanna feel you like that Stevie. I mean, we can switch if you like and you can, y'know, try being  _the dame_  if you want to, but for the first time I'd really like it if you could, uh, do me."

 

"Yeah," Steve was nodding as well, his eyes bright, "Yeah Bucky, yeah I want to, I wanna do you. Tell me what you want and I'll do it for you. Please."

 

His anxiety rapidly dissipating in the face of Steve's eagerness, Bucky grinned and pushed Steve back down onto the bed, climbing back on top of him. "You just lay there for me Stevie, let me kiss you. God you're so sweet to kiss, better than any dame."

 

If Bucky could have kept on talking he would have, but he preferred to keep his lips sealed over Steve's, his tongue delving eagerly into the smaller boy's mouth and his hands roaming the wonderful, permissive body underneath him. Soon enough they were both naked, or close to, Steve's shorts pushed down around his knees and his shirt unbuttoned and hanging open over his shoulders while Bucky laid bare over the top of him, trying to fit his hand around both of their hard, cut cocks and drawing beautiful, desperate groans from Steve despite his only half-successful attempts.

 

"Bucky, please," Steve whined, his eyes screwed shut, "If we're gonna do it let's just do it already, you keep teasing like this and I ain't gonna be able to..."

 

Bucky grinned and rolled his hips against Steve one last time before relinquishing his grip on both of them and pulling away, "Okay, let's… Let's do it," he nodded, a little nervously. He'd thought about doing this for a long time. He’d already tried to put a finger in himself a couple of times in the bath, hoping the water would ease the way. It had a little, but the penetration had still burned like hell, and Steve was certainly bigger than his finger.

 

"I think I'm gonna... Jeez, um... I gotta, uh, kinda stretch a little, I guess? Otherwise it'll hurt..." It was almost as embarrassing as admitting he wanted to take Steve's cock up his arse in the first place, but Steve didn't seem to mind, he just nodded docilely and looked up at Bucky with that patient, trusting look he got sometimes when they fooled around. Slowly Bucky reached around behind himself and pressed the very tip of one dry finger into his hole, wincing at the burning sensation as he squirmed his finger in deeper.

 

"You okay?" asked Steve, and Bucky realised that he'd screwed his eyes shut tight. He opened them and looked down into Steve's concerned face.

 

"Yeah. I just- yeah, I think so. It hurts a little."

 

"You want me to help?"

 

Steve's fingers were smaller, and years at art school had made him more dexterous than Bucky's work-roughened digits. "Yeah," Bucky nodded, "Just start with one though. God, I want you Stevie."

 

"I know," murmured Steve with a shy smile, shuffling down the bed a little so he could reach. He circled the very tip of his finger around Bucky's entrance for a moment and that felt good, light teasing touches that made Bucky shiver, but when he pressed inside Bucky had to grit his teeth against the renewed burning of it.

 

"You sure you're okay?" Steve asked, his brow furrowed.

 

"Yeah," growled Bucky, determined to want this, to have this, regardless of a little pain.

 

"No you ain't... What if we made you a little wet? Would that help? Y'know, like how dames get wet and you just kinda... slide in," Steve blushed and turned away at his own suggestion, the statement possibly the dirtiest thing Bucky had ever heard him say.

 

"How?" Bucky asked, "I tried water before. I mean, y'know, on my own, to see if I'd like it. It helped a little but not much."

 

"Vaseline?" suggested Steve.

 

"Vaseline?" Bucky was surprised by Steve's sexual ingenuity, "Yeah I guess so, d’you reckon it'd work?"

 

Steve's blush deepened as he said, "The fairies down the docks use it. One of them said to me once, he asked if I had any and I didn't know that they used it for _that_ , so I asked why he'd want it and he told me. He thought I was like him, a... an _invert._ "

 

Bucky barked a laugh at the absurdity of Steve's continued aversion to the idea of being thought of as queer while he still had a fingertip lodged in Bucky's arsehole and his cock hard and rubbing up against another man's. "You ain't a fairy Stevie, and if you were I wouldn't care. On the other hand,  _I_ might be a fairy, seein' as what I'm asking you to do to me."

 

Steve smacked him lightly on the arm, "Shut up and pass me the Vaseline!"

 

Bucky sniggered and reached over to the cabinet beside Steve's bed where the petroleum jelly was kept easily accessible in order to soothe the blond's sensitive chapped lips and frequently split knuckles. He dropped the tin on the pillow beside Steve's head and dove in for a kiss, mouthing hotly against the blond's lips, "C'mon Stevie, slick up, I want you inside me."

 

Steve needed no further encouragement and with the Vaseline easing the way Bucky was soon rocking back on Steve's slim hand, groaning and demanding more, grunting at Steve to, "Get another one of those goddamn skinny fingers of yours inside me right now or so help me I'll do it myself!"

 

Steve obeyed every snarled order with that open, trusting expression that Bucky was just starting to get used to, twisting his fingers when he could and letting Bucky simply fuck himself on his hand when it suited him. At last, with three fingers buried deeply inside his friend and petroleum jelly slickly coating Bucky's inner thighs, Steve managed to whimper, "Buck, Bucky, d'you think... Are you ready? Fuck, I'm so ready Bucky, please... You got a rubber?"

 

How Bucky managed to stay composed enough to roll his eyes at that moment while he had half a hand lodged up his arse Steve never knew, but Bucky managed it somehow, drawling, "Am I a dame, Stevie? You gonna get me knocked up? _No._ I said I wanna feel you and I fucking will, so move your fingers outta the way and let me have you already!"

 

In Steve's admittedly limited experience it was usually the dame who laid down and let the fella stick it in her, so he made to sit up and change around their positions so that he would be on top. But Bucky didn't seem to want that, dropping a rough hand to Steve's shoulder and pinning him down on the bed while the larger boy very slowly positioned himself over Steve's cock and sank down on it. 

 

Steve couldn't move. It wasn't just Bucky's hand digging into his shoulder and pressing him into the mattress nor the weight of Bucky settled over his pelvis, he felt as if his whole body was paralyzed with the intensity of having Bucky take him like this. He groaned as Bucky shifted to a better angle. He was hot and wet like a girl, tighter than the couple of dames Steve had been lucky enough to find himself in this situation with before, but something about the entire thing felt so damn sordid, so perfectly taboo, that Steve had to concentrate pretty hard on just breathing and hoping that Bucky intended to take charge because he sure as hell wasn't capable of decision making right then. 

 

Bucky's head was thrown back as he sank down inch by slow inch, his lower lip caught between his teeth and a frown creasing his forehead, but the breathy little grunts he was making sounded pleased and when finally he was seated he let out a deep, satisfied sigh that made shivers spark along Steve's spine.

 

"Bucky..." Steve moaned.

 

"Shh!" hissed Bucky, eyes still closed as he dug his fingernails warningly into Steve's chest. Steve honest to god whimpered at the harsh treatment and screwed his own eyes shut, trying to focus on keeping his breathing deep and slow rather than the incredible feeling of the pinpricks of pain in his chest and having Bucky tight and willing around his cock.

 

Steve gasped and his eyes shot open a few moments later as Bucky began to move, at first just the slightest rocking of his hips, then bolder undulations as he adjusted to the feeling inside of him. He was panting harshly despite the slowness of his motions and when he opened his eyes to look down at Steve his pupils were dark and wild; Steve wondered if he looked the same.

 

"Christ," Bucky managed to gasp out, and his voice sounded strained, "Christ, Stevie. This is good- you feel so good. Christ. F-fuck."

 

Steve gave a low, animal whine, all language and coherency fled. His hands crept up Bucky's strong thighs to rest on the other boy's hips, kneading the flesh there and whining needily again.

 

Bucky panted down at him, a wild grin splitting his features as a few stray strands of hair fell down across his face, "You want more huh? You like this? Like me fucking you? Fuck Stevie, but I like it so much, so much." His fingernails dug sharply into Steve's chest again, eliciting a small, desperate cry from the smaller boy.

 

"You okay?" Bucky paused and looked down, suddenly tender.

 

"Yeah," managed Steve, "Yeah just... don't stop. I'm not gonna last but please don't stop."

 

Bucky leaned down to press a kiss to Steve's lips and they both moaned at the shift in position. Bucky rolled his hips a few more times, both of them attempting to continue the kiss but ending up just panting and mouthing at each other with tongues and teeth as Bucky fucked himself on Steve with less and less finesse as the urgency between them grew.

 

Eventually Steve turned away from the kiss with a pained expression to hiss out, "Bucky- I can't- "

 

Bucky soothed the blond with a hand in his hair and his lips on his throat, whispering hotly, "Don't hold back Stevie, come on, give it to me good."

 

Bucky's hips rolled again and Steve cried out, a split second of sound thundering through the quiet of the room before Bucky clamped his hand down over Steve's mouth to gag the noise, the smaller boy's hips driving up weakly as he came. Once Steve was lying quiet and dazed, Bucky released his mouth and fisted his hand around his own cock, remaining astride his friend as he jerked himself off. Steve quickly caught on, wrapping his own still-slick fingers around Bucky's and pumping him in tandem until Bucky jammed a fist in his own mouth and came with a muffled grunt, spurting his release over Steve's bare chest.

 

Bucky slid off Steve with his eyes fixed on the middle distance and his lips parted, seemingly not even aware he was doing so, and landed beside the smaller boy on the bed with a soft gasp. Silence lay between them for a few minutes, each pressed against the other as their skin cooled and they became more aware of the wet, sticky messes they had made. Finally Bucky threw an arm over Steve and pulled the other boy close so that his back was flush to Bucky's broad chest.

 

"That was aces," whispered Bucky reverently, nuzzling his nose against the soft skin just beneath Steve's ear, "I can't believe you let me... you're the best, Stevie." He ran gentle fingers over the red marks he'd scratched into the pale, skinny chest and pressed feathery kisses across Steve's neck and shoulders. "I don't never want it any other way from now on, that was... Christ. You're so beautiful, Steve."

 

Steve stirred in his arms at that and Bucky chuckled quietly, knowing how the smaller boy protested any slight on his masculinity.

 

"Shh Stevie, I don't mean beautiful like a dame, I mean beautiful like… like fireworks. Or like when you see a big storm coming up the beach from the ocean and the sky's all purple and the lightning flashes and you just can't look away... You're beautiful and fierce and I don't never wanna look away from you."

 

Steve ducked his head and Bucky raised a hand to stroke his hair gently.

 

"You okay, Stevie?"

 

"Yeah," murmured Steve, his face half pushed into a pillow and his voice quiet and small, "Yeah Buck, I'm good. You're s'good to me."

 

Bucky smiled fondly and pressed his lips to the back of Steve's neck, "Someone's gotta look after you. You want me to clean you up?"

 

Steve made a sleepy little noise of assent into the pillow and Bucky's smile grew. He carefully extracted himself from the bed and walked - a little stiffly - to the living room. He grimaced as he knelt down beside the tub to dip a wash cloth into the cold water and felt something slick run down his inner thigh. Maybe Steve had been onto something after all when he'd suggested using rubbers but in the heat of the moment Bucky hadn't considered the messy ramifications of fucking bare, he'd just wanted to feel Steve as close and intimately as possible.

 

He turned the stale water in the tub murky cleaning himself up, then rinsed the cloth as best he could and took it into the bedroom to tend to Steve in the same way. Steve huffed and squirmed - "Ain't a _baby_ ," he grumbled continuously into the pillow - but Bucky laughed and held him down and wiped him clean despite his half-hearted struggles.

 

"Hush your mouth, you little punk," chuckled Bucky affectionately, throwing the now dirty wash cloth to the floor and folding Steve up in his arms again, both of them curled together on the too-small bed, "You can complain all you want but I ain't letting you go. Tonight you're mine Stevie, and I got you right where I want you, so hush up."

 

Steve answered with a petulant huff of breath but made no more move to get away, and not long afterwards both boys were snoring softly, tangled up in one another in the single bed.


	8. Chapter 8

"I want you to run me."

 

Bucky rolled onto his elbow and looked across the room at Steve laying on his back on his own bed, both arms tucked under his head as he stared up at the ceiling with a resolute look on his gaunt face. His skinny frame was swamped in one of Bucky’s old sweaters but the cool of the room still made Bucky wonder why Steve wasn’t wearing a scarf as well.

 

"Huh?" Bucky asked, nonplussed, " _Run you?_ What are you, a horse?"

 

Steve snorted, "C'mon Bucky, I'm being serious. You and the other fellas run about and play ball and haul crates all day, but I never done any of that stuff. I couldn’t as a kid but now… I haven't had an attack in nearly a year, I'm sure if I started training I could take it, it'd probably even make me healthier."

 

"And this has nuthin’ to do with that film reel of British tommies in their training camps that we saw yesterday at the pictures?"

 

" _No_ , " Steve flushed a little at being so easily found out. "I mean maybe, a little, but it's good for a man to exercise. It's _normal_. C'mon Bucky, it'll be fun, you'd be like my drill sergeant. I bet you'd love that huh?"

 

Bucky couldn't help a hot burst of arousal at the thought of barking out orders and having Steve snap to, but he still wasn't convinced the idea was a good one. "What if you hurt yourself? Running about like you think you got something to prove - to _me_ of all people - you could trigger an attack, Steve. What kind of damn fool would I be to keep you well all winter then let you go off and have a heart attack trying to win the hundred metre dash?"

 

Steve huffed quietly, "I know I can do this Bucky. You gotta let me try."

 

"I don't gotta let you do _nuthin',_ " grumbled Bucky, "You'd be safer and happier if I just kept you tied to my bed all the time."

 

Steve chuckled softly, "Safer, maybe... I'm gonna do this Bucky, whether you help me or not. I'd rather do it with you beside me."

 

"Don't know why you ask for my damn opinion if you already made up your mind," Bucky groused, but he relented, "Fine. We start in the morning, I want you dressed and ready by sunrise so's we can go out while there ain't too many people about."

 

"Yessir," grinned Steve, throwing a mock salute to the ceiling.

 

The next morning found Steve and Bucky in an alleyway near their tenement, Steve doubled over puking and Bucky rubbing his back sympathetically. The winter sky was a dull grey and as the steam rose from the cooling puddle of vomit Bucky thought for the hundredth time that this was at least the third or fourth stupidest idea Steve had ever had.

 

“I told you not to run that last block, didn’t I?” the larger boy asked, not unkindly, as Steve retched again, “When you gonna learn that I know what’s best for you better than you do Stevie? Next time I say we’re takin’ a break, you take a damn break, okay?”

 

“Okay,” Steve nodded quietly, wiping the back of his hand over his mouth.

 

“Come on then,” Bucky clapped Steve on the shoulder, “Maybe runnin’ ain’t your thing, with your lungs it probably wasn’t such a good idea anyway. But that’s okay, lotsa people ain’t so good at runnin’. We can try something else, maybe calisthenics, or just some plain ol’ drillin’, push ups and the like, how ‘bout that?”

 

Steve nodded, still catching his breath.

 

“Good man,” smiled Bucky reassuringly, despite his own misgivings, “Now come on home, I gotta get ready for work.”

 

Steve’s poor aptitude for running however seemed to extend into just about every other exercise regime Bucky tried him on. Calisthenics were a disaster, Steve proving that it wasn’t just the girls at dance halls that put him off his moves but the fact that he had two left feet. Games of football with the boys wasn’t much better, sending Steve home with scraped knees and bloodied, blistered feet. He could barely manage one push up, and pull ups were entirely out of the question. One spring weekend, they saw a strongman at Coney Island and Steve immediately enthused about weight lifting, but when he damn near dislocated his shoulder trying to lift one of the packing crates at the dockyard Bucky forbade any further attempts.

 

“I’m gonna be a skinny little runt forever,” said Steve miserably one night as he caught sight of himself in the glass that hung in their bedroom.

 

“Hey, don’t let on like that,” said Bucky quietly, coming up behind him and wrapping strong arms around the blond’s narrow hips and bony chest in a possessive embrace, “You’re beautiful the way you are. Perfect little body all hard and wiry, nuthin’ extra to ya. Silky-soft blond hair like an angel. Big blue eyes and a nice, big cock. You don’t gotta be built like sailor to be a real man Stevie, and you know it. Now come to bed, let me show you how much I like that tight little body of yours...”

 

* * *

 

Steve came home to a dark, silent apartment, dropping his shabby coat and toeing off his shoes before seeking out Bucky, who was slumped on the sofa with a bottle of cheap whiskey. He didn't need to ask whether or not Bucky had heard the news, the lonely boozing was answer enough.

 

Steve had been sitting in the smoky draughting room of the architecture company he sometimes drew for on the weekends with a motley bunch of other artists, engineering students, and junior draughtsmen each hunched over their own drawing boards around him. There was usually a wireless playing in the background but for some reason that day it was switched off. Or it had been until the foreman had come in with a tense expression, called all the men away from their work, and switched it onto CBS.

 

_“The Japanese have attacked Pearl Harbor, Hawaii, by air, President Roosevelt has just announced. The attack also was made on all military and naval activities on the principle island of Oahu.”_

 

There was a hush as the young men all tried to take in what they were hearing, their expressions ranging from stunned to outraged. Steve's own thin face mirrored that of the supervisor, stony and set. They'd all been dismissed early after that. Steve figured that Bucky’s presence at home meant so had all the workers at the docks; he guessed a lot of people went home early that afternoon.

 

_"This battle has been going on for nearly three hours... It's no joke, it's a real war."_

 

Wordlessly Steve sat down next to Bucky and took the whiskey bottle, necking a quick mouthful and making a face at the cheap, nasty taste. Though Steve wasn't a big drinker when he was upset Bucky usually was, yet the bottle remained almost full, only a few mouthfuls worth of liquor missing.

 

"I don't want to go," Bucky said quietly, his hollow-eyed stare fixed out the window at the slanting light of the sunset.

 

"We gotta," said Steve, with as much resolve as he could muster, "It's the only decent thing to do. We knew this might happen, knew the war might cross the Atlantic. The US can’t just stand by and ignore something like that, I mean those men might have been soldiers but they weren’t on active duty and they didn’t deserve to die."

 

"I know that," snapped Bucky, taking the bottle back from Steve and downing a fierce gulp, "Sure as hell, me and the boys are goin' down first thing in the morning to enlist. We _gotta_ , but it don't mean I wanna. My daddy - god rest him - is gonna be real proud when they pin them stripes on me but Christ, I think I'll be lucky if I don't piss myself right there and then."

 

"You ain’t a coward," said Steve seriously, taking another swallow of whiskey, "I never met anyone braver than you, Buck."

 

Bucky laughed but there was a bleakness beneath the humour that Steve had never heard from his friend before, "Then you never looked in a mirror, Steve. A whole army of Steve Rogerses breathing down the Nazi's necks and the war would be won for the Allies tomorrow! The world's gone crazy, lettin' a jerk like me enlist and leaving you behind with the women and children."

 

Steve bristled a little at that, though he tried not to show it, "Whaddaya mean?"

 

Bucky heaved a deep sigh then pressed the bottle to his lips for a long pull, still not looking at Steve and swallowing thrice before saying quietly, "Asthma, poor eyesight, heart problems, high blood pressure, migraines, nervous troubles, flat feet, family history of tuberculosis… Shit Steve, you're the bravest guy I know but you're a guaranteed 4-F. No way they'll let you enlist."

 

"They will," said Steve stubbornly, snatching the bottle back and gulping down only half as much of the burning liquor as Bucky had managed, "They need good men, they'll take me. I've been exercising regularly and I can cheat the eye test, no problem. If you think I'm gonna let you go all the way to Europe without me then you're wrong Barnes, I ain't that easy to shake."

 

Bucky laughed again and this time the familiar warmth was in it, "Shake you? I'll be too busy trying to stop you steppin' on a land mine! They'll have to issue me two parade belts - one to wear and one to keep you tied up with! Gotta give them Nazis a fightin' chance at least."

 

They passed the bottle back and forth for a while in relatively companionable silence until Steve said at last, "I'll come with you tomorrow morning."

 

Bucky took another swig and then shrugged tiredly, "Sure. If that’s what you want."

 

_"War? Why it's automatically war."_

_"Don't tell me, I know."_


	9. Chapter 9

Bucky couldn't hide his grin at Steve's shocked gasp when the blond pulled the larger boy's undershirt over his head, revealing his bare torso. Bucky was seated on the edge of his bed with his trousers unbuttoned and Steve perched naked in his lap, both of them sporting wet, red lips and messy hair.

 

"What the hell did you _do_ Bucky?" Steve said, his voice quiet with awe as his fingers went to the inflamed skin right over Bucky's heart, once a smooth expanse of tanned skin over hard muscle but now hot and red and bearing the initials 'S. R.' in fresh black ink. The writing was plain, neat and unserifed, but very much _there_.

 

"D'you like it?" beamed Bucky, pushing his chest out so that Steve's fingers brushed the still-healing tattoo.

 

"I... I don't even know," Steve shook his head in impressed bewilderment, "When did you get this?"

 

"Last night after work. Some sailors came in for shore leave and one of them said he charged a buck to do it. A couple of the other guys who are shippin’ out were there and they wanted to get the initials of their sweethearts done so I figured I'd get the same."

 

Steve's wide eyes still hadn't left the two letters starkly emblazoned on his lover's chest. He was so enthralled with it that he hadn’t even flinched at Bucky’s mention of shipping out, a topic that always drew Steve’s ire. Instead he was tracing around the inking lightly with a fingertip, not wanting to hurt Bucky but unable to resist the urge to touch. "Bucky..." he breathed, overwhelmed by the gesture, "You know that's permanent right? You're gonna have that mark on you 'til the day you die."

 

Bucky smiled softly and reached up to caress Steve's face, an intimacy usually batted away huffily by the smaller boy but allowed in this raw moment.

 

"I know," Bucky said, his voice gentle but taking on the firmness of tone that Steve knew meant that Bucky wanted to fool around, "I _want_ it forever. You, right here, over my heart. That's where you belong Steve, you're mine and I'm yours and that's forever."

 

Steve was still gaping at the tattoo, but he lifted his eyes to look at Bucky as he said, "I want one too."

 

"Don't be dumb Stevie," Bucky chuckled as he ruffled Steve's hair, a sure fire way to rile up his feisty little lover, "Dames don't get their fella's names tattooed on them."

 

Steve snapped, just as Bucky had hoped he would, shoving Bucky hard and growling, "Ain't no dame! _You're_ the dame, you're the one who likes having my dick in your ass!"

 

Bucky was laughing, grabbing both of Steve's small hands and pinning them at the small of his back before kissing the other boy quiet. Steve was still squirming grouchily when Bucky pulled away and said in a low whisper, "I _love_ having your dick in my ass Stevie. And I love the idea of you walking around branded with my initials. Because you're mine ain’t you Stevie? And that dick is mine too, so lie the fuck down and let me ride you."

 

Steve shut his mouth and did as he was told just like Bucky knew he would. He was gorgeous, naked on his back, blue eyes flashing hungrily and his cock hard and eager. Bucky took an indulgent moment to admire the form spread out beneath him before shucking his trousers and shorts and climbing on top of Steve. 

 

"Give me the stuff," he growled, as Steve wriggled beneath him. The pot of Vaseline appeared in his hand a moment later and Bucky began opening himself slowly, taking his time and enjoying himself as Steve whined frustratedly, trapped beneath him and denied the pleasure of watching Bucky stretch himself open.

 

"You quit that racket," Bucky warned with a provocative roll of his hips, sliding two fingers easily in and out of himself, "Unless you want me to gag you. Anyone could hear you and find out what a greedy fucking whore you are, do you want that? You want them to know how much you like being tied down while I use you, how you love it when I come all over your chest and just keep riding you 'til I'm hard again and you're practically crying for it?"

 

Steve shuddered and groaned heatedly, his cock twitching heavily against his stomach, “Buck…”

 

"I bet I could bring you off like this," Bucky mused wickedly, pressing a third slick finger slowly inside himself, "Not even touching you, just talkin' dirty. Telling you what a slut you are, dirty fuckin' fairy who likes to get his dick wet with boys. You wanna get your dick wet, Stevie? You wanna be inside me? I bet you do. Look at you, all tense, you just can't wait for it. God."

 

Bucky liked it best like this, teasing Steve to distraction then riding him hard. He liked the control he had in this position too, and though he'd never admit as much to Steve, he liked the way he could keep an eye on the other boy, not let him exert himself too much on days when the summer air was thick and close and Steve's breathing was most likely to get erratic.

 

When it was really bad Bucky would just tie Steve to a chair and suck him off quick and dirty because nothing got Steve off as quickly as Bucky's mouth did, and doing that to Steve went right to Bucky's own cock so that when Steve was done it would only take a few strokes before Bucky was coming messily across Steve's thin chest. Sometimes he'd then lean down and spit Steve's come back into the smaller boy's mouth. He didn't know why exactly, but it made him hot just to think about doing it and he groaned as he continued fingering himself lazily.

 

But today there was a breeze shifting the balmy spring air and Bucky hadn't had Steve properly in weeks. It was Sunday, their favourite day for fooling around because most of the neighbours were either sleeping off hangovers from cheap rotgut or repenting their sins in church, and Bucky intended to get what he wanted.

 

"Don't tease, Buck," Steve gritted out as Bucky slid the blond’s cock into the cleft of his ass and slithered his hips, rubbing Steve all over himself.

 

"That an order? Okay Stevie, tell me to stop," challenged Bucky, leaning down to whisper hotly in Steve's ear as he continued to grind his ass against Steve's hard on, "Tell me to stop and I will, all you gotta do is ask... No? I thought not. You're so fuckin' easy for me Stevie."

 

They groaned in unison as Bucky reached around and pressed Steve into his slick hole, slowly sinking down until Steve was buried inside him to the hilt. Bucky had his head thrown back and his eyes screwed shut, his lips frozen in an open-mouthed grin as he adjusted to the fullness he had been missing for so long. Though he desperately wanted to, Steve knew better than to touch without permission. Instead he focussed on the blissful smile on Bucky's face and the fresh etching standing out starkly on his strong, tanned chest.

 

"Bucky, please," whined Steve as the seconds ticked by and Bucky remained immovable, for all of Steve's squirming, "Please Buck, I- " 

 

Quick as a flash Bucky's hand shot out and he shoved two fingers roughly into Steve's mouth, pressing down hard on his tongue and growling, "Shut up."

 

Steve moaned gratefully and his eyes slid closed as he began to suck on Bucky's fingers. Bucky smiled indulgently and began to fuck himself on Steve, starting slowly but building the pace of his thrusts until he was panting hard and Steve was all but gagging on his fingers. It was bliss. The air around them was suddenly stiflingly hot, sweat pouring down both bodies as flesh slapped wetly against flesh and Bucky bit down on his own fist to keep himself from moaning too loudly, Steve hot and heavy and perfect inside him, thrusting up to meet Bucky’s hips. 

 

He leaned forward to whisper dirty words in Steve’s ear but a sudden shooting star of pleasure inside him made him cry out sharply. They both froze as Bucky’s shout echoed through the flat, both counting the seconds until someone came to bang on their door and demand to know what was happening in there, but after a full minute of silence the two boys relaxed a little.

 

“You okay?” whispered Steve, afraid that he’d hurt Bucky somehow.

 

“Yeah,” breathed Bucky dazedly, “Yeah that was… that was really something. Uh, try it again, just push up and I’ll lean forward, and- _Fuck!_ Sorry, sorry,” he immediately dropped his voice after shouting out again.

 

“What is it?” asked Steve quizzically. Bucky always liked to talk a lot when they fooled around but he was usually sensible enough about keeping quiet. A little moaning here and there was okay, god knew they heard plenty of it coming from other apartments and Bucky had brought home enough girls that it couldn’t be considered unusual for sex noises to be coming from their own flat, but they both agreed that it was better to be safe than sorry.

 

“Goddamn, you gotta try this,” muttered Bucky under his breath, “Do it again, come on.”

 

Steve did, and this time Bucky managed to bite down on his own fist rather than shout aloud. The muscles on his chest rippled as he tensed up and Steve saw his own initials staring down him, each sighting sending a renewed bolt of shock and lust through him at the thought of what Bucky had gone and done.

 

“Keep it up, don’t stop,” implored Bucky, and Steve had never heard his voice sound so wrecked, Bucky who was usually so composed as they fucked, laughing and snapping out orders to Steve who was always so completely undone just seeing Bucky nude.

 

Steve complied, however mystified he was by Bucky’s suddenly strange behaviour, snapping his hips up again and again as Bucky grunted and groaned around his own hand until suddenly he was coming, spurting thickly across Steve’s heaving chest without either of them having touched his cock at all.

 

“Oh god, oh god, Christ almighty, god...” Bucky moaned in a low voice, and when Steve thrust up again the larger boy’s entire body spasmed and he shot out of Steve’s lap, collapsing onto the bed.

 

“Jesus Mary n’Joseph,” he groaned.

 

Steve was still surprised by the entire encounter; they’d had plenty of sex before but Bucky had never reacted like this. Usually once he’d come he liked to keep riding Steve until Steve did as well, and sometimes Bucky kept going until he was hard enough to come again, leaving Steve’s chest painted thickly with two loads of jism. But he’d certainly never come without a hand around his dick.

 

“You… okay?” Steve ventured nervously, still hard but feeling his arousal dying at Bucky’s odd behaviour.

 

“Yeah,” panted Bucky beside him, “Yeah, just… real sensitive. Jesus, Stevie… That was like- like nuthin’ else. I don’t even know what, but, you just- inside me. God.”

 

“I didn’t hurt you?”

 

“Shit no!” Bucky turned to look at Steve, the sight of his own seed splashed across that narrow chest making him catch his breath again, “No way Stevie, you made me feel amazing. That was the best I ever had, I swear on my daddy’s grave.”

 

Steve felt a little pride at that. He loved pleasing Bucky, he didn’t know why exactly, but sometimes just knowing he had made Bucky come was enough to set him off as well. His dick gave a twitch at the praise and Bucky eyed him thoughtfully.

 

“Can I try something new, Stevie?”

 

“Uh… sure?” said Steve, feeling his cock stir again at the nasty glint in Bucky’s eyes.

 

“You like it when I use my mouth you, don’t ya?” Bucky asked, and Steve nodded in reply.

 

“And you trust me, don’t you Stevie?”

 

Steve nodded again, keeping his eyes fixed on Bucky’s.

 

“Alright then.”

 

Bucky reached down to their discarded clothes and came up with Steve’s suspenders, which he looped around Steve’s wrists and then tied them to the headboard of the bed.

 

“Stay there for me, baby,” Bucky smiled, as Steve tugged experimentally at the improvised binding, “I’m gonna make you feel real good, I promise.”

 

Bucky’s tongue licked one long, slow stripe from the head of Steve’s cock down over his balls. Steve couldn’t help moaning, loving Bucky’s mouth on him but even more fired up by the thought of where exactly his cock had been only moments before. Bucky repeated the manoeuvre with a wicked grin, teasing Steve.

 

Once the smaller boy’s quiet moans were more or less continuous, Bucky pressed Steve’s legs up so that his feet were planted firmly on the mattress, then further, so that they were spread wide and suspended in the air, exposing his arse completely.

 

“Bucky,” said Steve cautiously, “Buck, what’re you…”

 

“Shh, Stevie,” Bucky breathed, blowing cool air over Steve’s vulnerable hole, “You trust me?”

 

“Y-yes,” Steve managed in a trembling voice.

 

“Good. You’re doing so good for me, Stevie,” Bucky soothed, “Just keep your legs up like that baby, just like that, good boy.”

 

Then Steve’s world whited out in one sharp gasp of breath as he felt Bucky’s wet, warm tongue swipe over his hole.

 

“Bucky!” he choked out in shock. Bucky had never done this for him before, though he’d experimented with it once or twice on the brunet.

 

“Shh, Stevie, it’s okay, I know it feels a little weird at first. Gimme a coupla minutes and then if you still don’t like it we’ll stop, okay?”

 

Steve whimpered his assent and wished Bucky had left his hands free so that he could hold up his legs, but he retained the position as he’d been instructed and let Bucky do as he pleased.

 

A couple of minutes later Bucky pulled away again, panting softly, “You okay? Can I keep going?”

 

“Y-yes,” begged Steve, barely coherent, “Yes Buck, yes, yes!”

 

Steve felt Bucky smirk against the sensitive skin of his arse before licking again at his hole, pressing his furled up tongue inside and making Steve gasp with filthy delight. Steve was so consumed by this bizarre new pleasure that it wasn’t until Bucky’s finger was in to the second knuckle that he realised he was being breached by anything other than his lover’s tongue.

 

“Bucky…” he moaned gratefully.

 

“That’s it baby, just relax. Let me give you what you need,” whispered Bucky, his voice heavy and reverent.

 

Steve could hardly have been more relaxed, his hands slack in their bindings, his trembling legs held up by one of Bucky’s strong hands while the other slowly penetrated him. Steve’s body opened willingly around the intrusion, saliva and Vaseline easing the way.

 

Bucky began probing his finger around, almost as if he were looking for something, and Steve was about to make some half-hearted quip about Bucky’s keys being in the tin by the door when his entire body convulsed and he let out a shriek.

 

Again both boys froze, ears attuned for the inevitable angry banging on the walls or door – Bucky’s shouts after all could have been noises of pain, but Steve’s girlish shriek would have been harder to lie about – but again they were lucky, their peace unbroken.

 

“Right there, huh?” Bucky smirked, once the danger had passed.

 

“B-Bucky,” Steve whispered helplessly.

 

“Shhh Stevie. Can you keep quiet for me? I know it’s hard but you gotta keep quiet.”

 

“Bucky,” Steve repeated, his voice small and desperate.

 

Without removing his probing finger from Steve’s body, Bucky once again stretched down to the floor, digging in amongst their discarded clothing before tugging free his boxer shorts and tossing them at Steve.

 

“Bite down on that Stevie, that’s it, try to keep quiet as you can baby. I’m gonna make you feel so, so good now…”

 

Steve came within minutes, also untouched, his mouth full of the taste and smell of Bucky’s sweat and musk and his body feeling like it was thrumming with electricity, his orgasm seeming to wring through him for whole minutes at a time. When at last he had stopped shaking and his spendings lay drying in a thick puddle across his stomach, Bucky eased his fingers out – Steve was dimly surprised to see two slide free from his slightly sore hole – and hauled himself up the bed to sling an arm across Steve’s chest and hug him close.

 

“Good?” Bucky mumbled into Steve’s neck.

 

“Mhmm” Steve sighed, still riding high on the full-bodied bliss his lover had managed to coax out of him with only two fingers.

 

“Good,” Bucky said, sounding satisfied and sleepy. Steve’s hip nudged against Bucky’s half hard cock but they were both too exhausted to do anything about it.

 

When Bucky woke up a few hours later it was deep in the middle of the night and Steve was still coated thickly in dried come. Bucky blearily deemed it a problem to be dealt with in the morning and tightened his grip around the slumbering body beside him, drifting back into a deep, satisfied sleep.


	10. Chapter 10

_I wanted out from bein’ poorer than poor / From the boonies where I knew I couldn’t win / I wanted out and the only light I saw was the army / And I knew I wanted in_

\- "Thirty Year Man", From Here To Eternity

 

* * *

 

Bucky knew from the way the door slammed exactly where Steve had been and what had happened.

 

“Again?” he called from the bedroom, putting down the pulp novel he’d been trying to concentrate on and going to see if Steve was alright.

 

“Again,” affirmed Steve, a hot, angry light shining in his eyes even as his thin chest heaved to fight back the tears that Bucky pretended not to notice. Bucky’s brand new uniform hung on the back of the bedroom door like an obscene joke at Steve’s expense, the first new clothes they’d owned between them in years, all pressed and ready to take his best friend far away, along with all the other real men.

 

“C’mon Stevie,” Bucky tried to soothe, “That’s the fourth time… You _know_ it’s illegal to lie on the enlistment form. Even if by some miracle they let you sign up you’ll be taken right into a court martial! Why not try for the quartermaster corps or something? Something where you won’t have to see no combat, where they won’t care that you got asthma and flat feet. You can still do your bit Steve, _without_ risking your damn hide.”

 

Though Steve was small he had the spirit of a much lager man, and Bucky wasn’t ashamed to say he was a little taken aback when Steve snarled ferociously at him, “I ain’t got that right! Not while other boys are out there risking theirs! Not while you- while you’re…”

 

Bucky knew better than to try to comfort Steve right now, even though the tears were falling freely over his gaunt cheeks. Trying to coddle or reassure him when he was in a mood like this was like trying to fight a fire by pouring gasoline over it. Bucky had read once that sometimes the best way to stop a big, raging fire was with explosives, and a lot of them, so he took that tack now with Steve.

 

“Well you sure ain’t got the right to talk to me like that!” Bucky snapped with his arms crossed sternly over his chest, and immediately he saw a pause in Steve’s fierce demeanour, “You wanna join the army? You think you can take it, tough guy? Get your scrawny ass outside on the double, we’ll see if you can take it, Rogers. Now!”

 

“Yessir,” Steve muttered, still glaring that hot glare but ducking his head respectfully as he passed by Bucky to get out the door and begin down the stairs towards street level.

 

"Again!" barked Bucky two hours later, and Steve struggled to push himself up with his scrawny arms straining. He collapsed halfway up, as he had done on every previous attempt.

 

"Again! I can keep you here all goddamn night if I gotta and I damn well mean to! Now do it!"

 

Steve's arms strained and finally - _finally_ \- he managed one complete press up before collapsing onto the ground, panting hard.

 

"Stevie," Bucky sighed gently, dropping the act as he squatted down while Steve struggled into a sitting position, "You think I'm being hard on you? A drill sergeant would kill you. Literally, kill you. Why can't you just take your 4-Fs and join the quartermaster corps?"

 

"I ain't a coward," Steve gritted out, glaring at the ground.

 

"Ain't nobody said you was," soothed Bucky, "Cowardice ain't got shit to do with your asthma and you know it. C'mon Steve, you know how yellow some of the biggest guys around here are, I seen you chase them off half a hundred times. But when it comes to the army they got rules, and one of their rules is you gotta be able to carry a fifty pound pack at a forced march for ten miles, which you got no chance of ever doing. Please, for your own good, give it up. You wanna help the war effort? You wanna do good? Join the quartermasters or even the medical corps. Hell, you could be an orderly in a hospital outfit and make time with all the nurses! You’re a good man Stevie, but you ain't a soldier and god willing you won't never be one."

 

Steve was still glaring at the ground, tears shining again in his eyes as he said softly but firmly, "You're wrong."

 

"And you're a damn fool!" snapped Bucky, "You wanna be a soldier so damn bad? Fine. Get up. We're gonna run to the next block and back. Maybe by the time you've puked your guts up again you'll be ready to see sense."

 

"Bucky-" Steve began placatingly, but Bucky cut him off.

 

"No. You wanted me to run you so get up and fuckin' run! You know what'll happen to you if your drill sergeant orders you to run and you can't? Best case scenario you'll get a beating. Maybe just from him, maybe from him and his buddies, all layin' into you. You want that, Stevie?"

 

Steve's posture stiffened defensively, "A beating ain't no worse than the 'flu. I can take it."

 

Bucky laughed coldly, "Yeah? I grew up on army bases Rogers, and I know a few things about how they treat new recruits who can't hack it. A beating is your best hope. Depending on how nasty your sergeant is he could put you under house arrest and starve you out for a few days, he could assign you to latrine detail - you know how many guys get dysentery or worse on that detail? - he could even charge you with willfully disobeying a direct order from a superior officer and drag you into a court martial. I never been in the stockade myself, but I never known a fella to come out of there the same."

 

"Bucky," Steve began again, his tone fallen into pleading in the face of Bucky's ire, "C'mon Buck, I- "

 

"Get up," Bucky snapped, "If I wanted to see you sittin' in the dirt I'd have told you to get on your fuckin' knees. On your feet, Rogers."

 

Steve stood unsteadily, not daring to look Bucky in the eye. Bucky grabbed him by the upper arm, his grip tight and fierce, dragging Steve along with him in the direction of their apartment and muttering darkly the whole way there.

 

"Stubborn little jerk, I oughta show you what a real beating feels like. You get mouthy with a drill sarge, see how far that gets you. He'll make you wish you weren't never born, let alone joined the damned army! Dumbass little jerk. Should beat the tar outta you for givin' me lip when I'm tryna help you. Punkass little no-good..."

 

By the time they got back to the flat Steve was feeling very small, the kind of feeling he usually only got once Bucky had had him tied up for a good long time. He was fully expecting to fetch the beating that Bucky had been threatening him with for the last half hour, so when the vice-like grip released his bruised arm Steve was surprised that he didn't immediately hear Bucky's belt slide out from the loops of his trousers.

 

"Look at me."

 

Steve looked up meekly and Bucky sighed, his eyes sad. He brushed a gentle hand over Steve's cheek and the touch was so contrary to what he'd been expecting that Steve shied away.

 

"Hey, no. Come here," Bucky said, sounding a little hurt. Steve allowed the soft touch the second time it was attempted, leaning into Bucky's warm palm and callused fingers.

 

"I'm sorry Stevie. Sometimes you just... you scare me so damn much. I don't wanna see you hurt, I just wanna keep you safe. You know I do."

 

Steve nodded, feeling a little dazed.

 

Bucky leaned in and kissed Steve gently on the lips, running his hands through soft blond hair as he did so. Steve allowed the contact but didn't respond as eagerly as he usually did, prompting Bucky to pull away and ask, "You okay, Stevie?"

 

Steve hesitated, then very slowly shook his head 'no' once.

 

Bucky's face fell. "Shit. Stevie, I'm so sorry, I didn't... can I touch you, is that okay?"

 

"Yeah," whispered Steve, not willing to lose the gentle, comforting warmth of Bucky's hand on his face just yet.

 

"Do you need me to do something? Should I leave you alone? Chrissake, I'm such an idiot Stevie, I didn't mean- "

 

"Don't go," Steve whimpered, "Please."

 

"Shh, I ain't going nowhere," Bucky soothed, cupping Steve's cheeks in both of his hands and kissing him once, gently, on the lips, "What do you need baby?"

 

"Just... take care of me?" Steve said in a small voice.

 

"You sure?" Bucky frowned a little, "Can you handle that right now? You look a little… out of it."

 

"I need it," murmured Steve.

 

"If you're sure," nodded Bucky, stepping just a fraction away from Steve, "But we're gonna start slow, okay? Parade rest."

 

Steve gave him a lost look. 

 

"Parade rest?" Bucky reiterated, "No? Here."

 

Bucky arranged Steve in the correct position, spreading his legs hip width apart and clasping his hands together in the small of his back, one over the other. Steve went easily, his body pliant under Bucky's touch.

 

"There," said Bucky, smiling as he looked Steve up and down, "That's perfect Stevie, that's what a real soldier looks like. Can you hold that for me?"

 

Steve nodded sharply.

 

"Good man," smiled Bucky, "You hold like that for me but you holler if I do something you don't like, okay?"

 

Steve nodded a little less certainly this time but retained the pose as Bucky slowly slid the smaller boy's suspenders off his shoulders to tangle around his crossed wrists, then unclipped them entirely.

 

"Okay?" breathed Bucky close on Steve's neck as he pressed up against the blond to begin unbuttoning his trousers. Steve nodded.

 

Bucky took Steve's trousers and shorts down to his ankles, leaving him in nothing but his shirt. Steve wasn't hard though, and as Bucky knelt down before him he paused again to look up and ask, "Are you sure this is okay, Stevie?"

 

Steve looked uncomfortable as he said, "Yeah, it's fine. Just... just do it. Take it, take what you want. That's what you always do and I- I like that. You don't gotta keep asking me. You're in charge here, Buck."

 

Bucky nodded; if in charge was what Steve wanted then in charge was what he'd get. 

 

“Parade rest, Rogers. Move a muscle and I’ll beat you within an inch of your life.”

 

Steve let out a small sigh and Bucky knew he was doing right. Very gently he leaned up and took Steve’s soft cock in his mouth, laving at it with his tongue and feeling it grow quickly under his attentions, taking a certain amount of pride both in how quickly Steve got hard for him and how well Steve was maintaining his position, not having so much as flinched while Bucky sucked him.

 

Once Steve was fully erect Bucky pulled away, smiling up at his friend and saying softly, “You still with me, Stevie?”

 

“Yeah, Buck,” Steve sighed, “Yeah, m’here.”

 

“Good,” Bucky smiled, “Now what do you want?”

 

It was a test and they both knew it. Sometimes when they played these games Steve would spit and snarl no matter how much Bucky smacked him around or how long he kept him tied up for, and sometimes he’d fall almost instantly into this little calm state where he was almost childlike in his willingness to just do whatever Bucky told him to. When he got like that he found it almost impossible to make decisions for himself, so when Steve hesitated for a long time before saying, “I, uh… whatever you want, Buck,” then Bucky knew that he was in that perfect, quiet little space they both loved.

 

“That’s fine Stevie, that’s just fine. I’ll tell you what we’re gonna do.”

 

Another little sigh of relief escaped Steve and Bucky took a second to just enjoy the warmth that such trust and devotion from a little firecracker like Steve stirred in him before continuing, “I’m gonna stay down here and suck you, because you know how much I love having you in my mouth. You’re gonna stay at parade rest but you come whenever you need to because I wanna taste you, Stevie. That’s what I want, okay? So that’s what you’re gonna give me.”

 

The tiniest nod from Steve was all Bucky needed to take the blond’s cock back into his mouth, working the shaft with one hand while the other rested calmingly on Steve’s jutting hip bone and his mouth slurped and sucked at the head.

 

The first couple of times they’d done this Steve had squirmed away and complained that it was dirty, but Bucky had smacked him sharply and told him to quit being such a damn fool. When that hadn’t worked, Bucky had tied him to a chair and sucked him for almost a whole hour without letting Steve come. After that, the blond hadn’t ever complained about Bucky’s predilection for using his mouth again.

 

It wasn’t too long before Steve’s thighs started quivering, and Bucky reached his hand down to gently tug at Steve’s balls, taking the shaft as deeply into his mouth as he could manage and sucking hotly. Steve managed to hold position even as he gasped harshly and came down Bucky’s throat, never deviating from the assigned stance until Bucky tugged him down to the floor where he cradled Steve’s boneless body in his lap.

 

For once Bucky didn’t run his mouth, he just stroked Steve’s hair gently and held the blond tight to him. Steve didn’t know exactly when or why he started crying, but his shirt collar was wet through and his voice was hoarse and his eyes were red and sore by the time he was done, and all the while Bucky just kept holding him. He was exhausted, and for once in his life he didn’t raise any protest when Bucky lifted him as easily as a child and carried him to bed.


	11. Chapter 11

_Goodbye / Up at dawn / Gettin’ gone / I’m on my way / Goodbye / Shippin’ out / It’s all about to start today / Goodbye / Leavin’ now / But I don’t know how to say / Goodbye_

\- "Some Kinda Time (Reprise)", Dogfight

 

* * *

 

 

Bucky came home around two in the morning, closing the door and toeing off his shoes as quietly as he could. Considering that he was drunk out of his mind it wasn’t very quiet at all, but Steve didn’t mind, he was still lying in bed awake with Dr Erksine’s proposal turning over and over in his mind as he waited for his best friend to come home for one last night. He knew it had been a bum thing to do, walking out on Bucky and the double date the night before the 107th deployed, but Steve had never been much of a dancer and meeting the good doctor had opened up just about the only real opportunity life had ever thrown his way…

 

When he’d come home the apartment had seemed curiously empty, devoid of all Bucky’s possessions which had either been pawned for rent money or packed neatly away in the kit bag at the end of the larger boy’s untouched bed. It made it easier knowing that for tonight at least Bucky would still be coming back, his mere presence restoring some of the missing sense of ‘home’, but Steve didn’t like to think about how cold the flat would become when Bucky shipped out the next morning and even the warm promise of his homecoming was withdrawn…

 

Steve had been planning to advertise for a new roommate but he guessed now with Dr Erskine’s offer on the table he wouldn’t have to; he made a mental note to call on old Mr O’Hara the landlord in the morning and let him know that the flat would be going empty. He supposed he’d have to get their mail forwarded to the orphanage, it was the only place that might take it, but then again who would write to them?

 

“Steve?” Bucky slurred, stepping into the bedroom upon seeing the gas lamp’s dim light, “Why you awake?”

 

“Couldn’t sleep,” Steve answered noncommittally. He still didn’t know whether or not to tell Bucky about finally making it. On the one hand, he would get to ship out with his best friend and they’d go over to the front together, but on the other hand Bucky had been so vehemently against Steve’s joining up in the first place that it was likely to start a blazing row, especially if Bucky was as drunk as he seemed to be.

 

“M’gonna miss ya, Stevie,” Bucky mumbled, sliding without hesitation into Steve’s bed and nuzzling his face into the sharp juncture between the smaller boy’s neck and shoulder, “Don’t wanna leave ya. S’gonna be s’hard to leave ya.”

 

Steve opened his mouth to carefully tell Bucky that maybe he wouldn’t have to leave without him, but the other boy continued to murmur drunkenly as he shrugged out of his dress shirt and suspenders, then clumsily pulled off his undershirt.

 

“Stevie baby… Y’re my best guy, ain’t no dame could ever… Imma miss ya so damn much, I can’t even… Steve, Stevie… M’glad you’re stayin’ but I wish I didn’t hafta go…”

 

Bucky was struggling with his belt buckle and Steve gently opened it for him, helping him to slip out of his tailored trousers and shorts and leaving him naked, curled up against Steve’s side under the covers. Just the sight of Bucky’s bare body made Steve’s own body react, especially when he stole a look at his own initials inked over Bucky’s heart in the light of the gas lamp. Steve was still wearing his shorts but Bucky was pawing ineptly at the waistband and slurring maudlin endearments.

 

“Wanna feel ya Stevie, want your skin on mine, one last time… c’mon Stevie, just let me… Gawd but there ain’t no business for a fella like me in the army, everyone knows all queers are cowards and I’m so queer for you Stevie… Fuck, I want you… I love you Stevie, love you so fuckin’ much it hurts, ‘n it’s gonna hurt s’bad to leave you behind… But you’ll be safe, that’s the… the main thing. You gotta promise me, while I’m gone, you’ll keep outta trouble… Stevie… Keep ya nose clean, like your ma used t’say… You gotta… Stevie… Steve…”

 

Steve gently reached across Bucky’s sleeping form and switched off the gas lamp. Even if he’d told Bucky tonight the chances were good that the other boy would have forgotten in the morning anyway. It could wait until first light, once Bucky had some black coffee in him and was composed enough to hear Steve out. It could wait…

 

Steve tried not to feel lonesome as he pulled Bucky’s arm around his thin chest, their naked bodies flush with Bucky’s tattooed chest against Steve’s knobbly back; it wouldn’t be the last time they fell asleep together like this, Steve vowed to himself as he breathed in Bucky’s scent - a heady cocktail of whiskey, cigarette smoke, and _two_ different lady’s perfumes all underscored by a sweet, thick musk all of his own - they’d be doing this for the rest of their long lives together, army or not.

 

* * *

 

“Shit!”

 

Steve awoke to an elbow in his chest and fell into an immediate coughing fit.

 

“Sorry, sorry!” Bucky shushed him, ‘Wh’time is it? I gotta go!”

 

The sun was halfway up and the bedroom was flooded with golden light; Steve wondered that Bucky wasn’t nursing the hangover from hell considering how drunk he’d been, but perhaps adrenaline was holding it at bay.

 

“Oh god, I’m late, I’ll really be for it if I turn up late!” Bucky was already wriggling back into his trousers from the night before, the perfectly pressed lines now crumpled and wrinkled from a night tossed haphazardly on the floor.

 

Once the coughing had tapered off, Steve hauled himself out of bed and into the kitchen, squinting out the window at the church clock just barely visible at the other end of the street; “It’s only six thirty, Buck. You got time aplenty, an hour at least.”

 

Bucky exhaled with relief, one leg still stuck in his wrinkled trousers, “Thank the lord for that! If I miss that boat they’ll take me down for desertion before I even get started! Where’s my goddamn shirt…”

 

Steve went down the hall to the washroom and filled up their kettle, setting it to boil and scooping some coffee granules out for the both of them; it was now or never.

 

“Bucky, I gotta tell ya- ”

 

“Tell me in a minute Stevie, I gotta go take a leak,” interrupted Bucky in a harassed voice. He grabbed their toiletries and headed down to the washroom.

 

By the time Bucky came back the coffee was ready and Steve was heating up some thin porridge on the stove for the both of them.

 

“I sure am gonna miss your cookin’ Stevie,” grinned Bucky affectionately and without a hint of sarcasm despite the fact that the oatmeal would be plain and sludgy just like it had been for the last two weeks as they hadn’t been able to afford any salt or sugar, “I’ll have to get used to field rations from now on! Lord save me from cold tinned stew and hardtack biscuits...”

 

“Maybe you won’t have to miss it,” began Steve, seizing on a good opening for his big announcement, “Not seeing as I’ll be- ”

 

“You seen my hat?” Bucky interrupted again, distracted as he tried to piece his parade uniform back together from the various corners it had been drunkenly flung into the previous night, “I know I came home with it…”

 

Steve sighed, “I put it on the hat stand by the door. C’mere ya jerk, your coffee’s goin’ cold.”

 

Bucky grabbed the hat with a noise of triumph and set it on his head at a jaunty angle, careful not to mess too much with his carefully slicked hair.

 

“How do I look?”

 

 _Beautiful_.

 

“Like a bit of rough trade someone jammed into a soldier’s uniform for kicks,” Steve teased.

 

“Ya punk,” Bucky retorted with a grin, “You watch your mouth Rogers or I’ll have a word with the enlistment fellas and make sure you _do_ get drafted!”

 

Steve opened his mouth to say something along the lines of, “Well it’s too late for that!” but Bucky just kept on talking over him, running his mouth the way he always did when he was nervous.

 

“Coffee too! You treat me so good Stevie, what am I gonna do without you, huh? S’pose I’ll have to wrangle some little private into making my coffee every morning. Do they even got coffee in Italy? Christ knows. Might have to drink tea like them stuffy Brits do, can you imagine?”

 

Steve couldn’t get a word in edgeways and eventually he stopped trying. He let Bucky ramble about coffee and porridge and nodded when Bucky said he’d write just as soon as he knew what it was the Italians drank with their breakfast. He listened to conjecture on army rations, supply lines, where and how often leave would be allowed, how much the cost of a stamp might be from Europe to America, and how on earth Bucky was going to find an iron to fix his trousers before he needed to be on parade at the docks in a half hour’s time.

 

Eventually Bucky’s chatter tapered off and they sipped their coffee in pregnant silence, the weight of the morning descending upon the pair of them.

 

“Bucky, I- ” Steve began at the exact same moment that Bucky opened his mouth.

 

“Stevie, I’m gonna miss you so damn much.”

 

Steve felt his words stoppered in his throat at that, though it wasn’t anything he hadn’t heard before; Bucky had been saying it non-stop since the day he enlisted a couple of months ago. Maybe it was because this time, Bucky was saying it with tears shining in his usually sunny eyes.

 

“I… I don’t know what else to say about it. I love you, and I-I’m gonna miss you real bad Stevie, real bad,” Bucky said, blinking rapidly and suddenly looking away, “I think they censor the post so’s I ain’t gonna be able to write none of that in my letters, but you know it don’tcha? I love you. There ain’t gonna be no one else for me, not ever. It’s all you, Stevie. And when this is done, and I come home, we’re gonna take my army pension and we’re gonna find somewhere nice to live, you got that? I’m gonna look after you. I always will.”

 

Steve couldn’t speak. It almost felt like a slowed down asthma attack, his breath caught in his throat and his lungs trying so hard to pump something out when nothing was coming. All he could do was make a choked-off little noise and throw his arms around Bucky’s neck like a goddamned child.

 

It helped Steve’s ego a little that they were both of them crying, holding each other tight and bawling likes babes the pair of them, Bucky’s big hand stroking through Steve’s fine hair as the larger boy repeated over and over that he loved Steve and there would never be no one else for him. Steve whispered back that he loved Bucky too and he was a stupid dumb jerk for starting both of them off crying like dames. They kissed messily, tears streaking their lips. Neither of them said a word about how long Bucky might be gone for or what would happen if he didn’t make it back…

 

“I love you, you little punk,” Bucky snuffled, as both of their tears began to die off.

 

Steve wiped his shirt sleeve across his face, mumbling, “I love you too, ya jerk. I’ll be seein’ you in a little while though, don’t worry, because I’ll- ”

 

The church bell down the street chimed half past seven and Bucky leapt to his feet as though he’d been scalded.

 

“I gotta go!” he yelped, and despite the bright, ruddy patches on his cheeks from the crying, Steve realized that he’d never seen his friend look so damn pale in all his life.

**Author's Note:**

> And thus begins my first Stucky fic... Feel free to visit me on tumblr! http://anglophiliac-x.tumblr.com


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